


The City That Never Sleeps

by orphan_account



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AU, Action/Adventure, Basically centers around the OC's, Don't Like Don't Read, F/M, OC, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-04
Updated: 2015-05-23
Packaged: 2018-03-10 13:09:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 22
Words: 39,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3291473
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set at the beginning of season 5. Lucifer is out of the cage and ready to bring hell on earth. But when he crash lands in New York; no one is prepared for the twist of fate that changes everything.</p><p>This story will likely remain unfinished.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Lucifer always loved flying. That had been one of the worse parts of the cage. There was no room to even stretch his wings.

But now he was free; and he had a vessel (although Nick wouldn't last very long, he was only a temporary thing until Sam said yes) and could actually start this whole apocalypse. But first…

First a quick flight, to finally stretch his wings after eons of captivity, and to see what those humans had done to the planet.

It was worse than he feared. He could barely even recognize the Earth. It disgusted him to see what had become of the planet. How could these disgusting cockroaches even merit father's attention? They weren't even worthy of life. He couldn't wait to roast the whole lot of them.

But unfortunately he forgot the first rule Michael had taught him: always look where you're flying, and he slammed straight into the side of the empire state building. Luckily he landed in an alley so no one saw him.

Lucifer groaned in pain. "What the hell!" he exclaimed to no one in particular. He shouldn't have even been able to crash into the side of the building. He had been in a form of pure energy; he should have passed right through it. Unless the building had been plated with one of the celestial metals. Humans, always messing around with things that didn't concern them.

If the building had been plated with a celestial metal, that would explain why it hurt so bad. And was that blood? Yep that was blood. He was so lucky that no one was around to see this; he was the freaking devil for dad's sake.

But fate is a bitch; and it appeared that she wouldn't let him suffer in solitude.

"Hello?" Shouted a voice from the mouth of the ally, "Is someone there?"

Lucifer didn't respond, the last thing he wanted was help from a human. But the figure, instead of turning away, ran toward him.

"Wow" she remarked, looking him up and down. "What happened?"

"Nothing." Lucifer snapped. "Just go away."

"Were you mugged?" She asked. Then she sighed and shook her head. "Damn lycanthropes. You'd think that they'd have learned their lesson by now."

"It wasn't lycanthropes." Lucifer said starting to feel a bit uncomfortable. This girl, whoever she was, was most likely a hunter.

"Oh really." The girl said sounding amused. "Then what happened to you?"

"I, uh fell."

"What did you fall off of, the top of the Empire State Building?" She scoffed.

"Something like that" He admitted.

Hold on. She was a human. What the hell was he talking to a human for? This was beneath him!

"Well look buddy, I'm pretty sure you need stitches. So I'll just call an ambulance and…"

"No" Lucifer said suddenly, dragging himself to his feet. "That won't be necessary."

But he was overcome with a wave of nausea and collapsed again. Or he would have if what's-her-name hadn't caught him.

"Don't touch me!" Lucifer half-shouted. Okay now he was being a little ridiculous, but the pain was interfering with his mental process, oh and did he mention that he couldn't see straight? He had the right to be a little ridiculous.

"Hey buddy, it's okay, calm down." She whispered soothingly. "I can patch you up at my apartment."

She grabbed him again, but this time only touching his clothes. Lucifer appreciated the gesture, but it was only a little better because eww human.

"My apartment is only a few blocks east." She said. "Can you walk?"

"Yeah." Lucifer grumbled. The last thing he wanted was to accept help from a human but he was in too much pain to really argue.


	2. Chapter 2

Elizabeth Holloway (or Liz, if you like) had no idea what she had gotten herself into. But that wasn't new. She always seemed to find herself in the middle of some catastrophe. And as NYC's only local hunter that happened more often than you might think.

When she saw a bright streak of light falling from the Empire State Building, well that just screamed supernatural. She had half expected some pagans to be fighting again (after all NYC had the largest Pagan population in the world). Imagine her surprise when she only found one, normal looking, bruised and bleeding guy.

But she couldn't just leave whoever he-was in the ally. He materialized in a big ball of light, fell at least forty stories, and survived. Something was off about him, and it was her job as a hunter to find out what.

It took ages to drag this guy to her apartment. He was barely walking at all. He nearly collapsed on the way. And when they actually got to her apartment building, she had to walk him around to the back door to avoid her doorman. Luckily the elevator was in the back. When they finally got to her apartment, whoever-he-was collapsed on one of the chairs in the dining room.

Liz examined his wounds. He had a large gash on his arm, and one on his leg. She sighed to herself and got the first aid kit.

"This is going to sting a bit." She told him.

He nodded, but said nothing in response. He seemed to be trying to say a few words as possible, without actually ignoring her. He had said all of twenty-two words to her so far. You had to admire his discipline.

Liz got the necessary equipment to stitch him up. While she worked, he tried to stay quiet, but every once in a while a hiss of pain escaped his lips. Despite this he was a remarkably good patient; he barely fidgeted at all.

"Right, finished." She declared after a while, and went into the kitchen to wash the blood of her hands.

While she washed the blood off her hands (hydrogen peroxide dissolves blood FYI) Liz discreetly watched her strange guest. He was currently examining the T.V. remote like it was the most interesting thing in the world. She still had no idea who, or what, he was. The needle she had used to sow him up was silver; so that ruled out lycanthropes, werewolves, skinwalkers, skin changers, or anything else that could change its shape. If he had been a vampire the wounds would have just healed. A chaos demon or regular demon would have just shrugged off the wounds. A fairy or elf would have teleported back to its home realm, and she knew all the pagans currently living in New York. She was at a lost.

"So." Liz said as casually as she could manage. "Who exactly are you."

He froze. Then he swiveled around in his chair and studied her for a long moment. "They call me Lucifer" he said finally. There was a crack of lightning outside, and for a brief moment you could see the outline of wings on the wall behind him.

"Lucifer" she repeated. "As in, the King of Hell."

He nodded.

Liz was slightly panicking. She had dealt with archangels before but Lucifer was older and, if the stories were to be believed, more powerful than Gabriel (long story, don't ask). And the only thing that could kill an archangel was an archangel blade, anyway. Liz decided that the best course of action was to talk.

"So, can I ask what the king of hell is doing in New York?" Liz asked carefully.

"Believe me, it was not by choice." Lucifer said. Then he leaned forward and studied her. "So can I ask, what's with the lack of reaction? I mean, if I told most people that I was the king of hell they would probably have a much different reaction."

Liz shrugged "I'm not most people."

He tilted his head and considered her. "No, you're a hunter."

Liz tensed, half expecting to be smote. "That obvious, huh?"

"Normal people usually don't have military grade first aid kits in their apartments." He smirked. "But I'm also kind of surprised you haven't tried to kill me already."

"I'm not stupid. I know archangels can only be killed with archangel blades." Liz half-smiled.

"So, you decide to talk instead of attacking, smart." Lucifer considered her. "What's your name?"

"Elizabeth Holloway." She said. "But most people call me Liz."

There was a knock at the door and mail fell through the mail slat. "Hold on, let me get that."

Liz bent over and picked up the envelopes. She shuffled through, examining them. "Bill." She said aloud. "Bill, bill, Newspaper…" she passed the newspaper over to where he was. "Do you want to look at that?" she asked him.

Lucifer was in a state of disbelief. He couldn't believe that a human, a hunter, had accepted him into her home as easily as she did. While he had been locked in the cage he could still see events unfolding on earth, and he had seen enough to know that this wasn't normal behavior for humans. He took a moment to study her. She had shoulder length light brown hair, bright vivid blue eyes, fair skin, and freckles. She was fairly pretty, by human standards.

Lucifer picked up the newspaper she had offered him and examined it. 'Gang Violence Increases!' the headlined screamed at him. Meanwhile, Liz continued thumbing through her mail.

"Mars, dammit!" she exclaimed suddenly.

His head snapped around "What?"

Liz shook her head. "Damn pagans, they'll be the death of me." She muttered darkly, throwing an envelope on to the counter away from her.

Lucifer tilted his head in confusion "What do you mean?"

"Hera's been pestering me, Mars has been causing trouble again and somehow it's always my job to set him straight before he does something stupid; like start a war with another pantheon." Liz huffed.

"You deal with pagans?" Lucifer asked in disgust.

"Not by choice, trust me. But someone has to keep them from tearing apart the city." Liz shook her head. "There are a lot of them in this city, for some reason."

Lucifer didn't know what to know what to say to that; and there was a long awkward pause. "I should go." He said finally.

"Yeah, I'm sure you've got some very important world destroying to do." Liz joked. Then her face turned serous. "But make sure to remember this."

"What?" He asked in confusion.

"When you're out destroying the world, remember this; the day a human was kind enough to help the devil." She said firmly.

There was really nothing more to say to that, so he left.

Later, as he watched the city from the top of the empire state building (the building had been reinforced with celestial metals, damn humans) he did remember; and as he replayed the experience in his head he decided that he owed Elizabeth. The very least he could do is take care of that pagan for her. Those sanctimonious bastards had it coming anyway.


	3. Chapter 3

Lucifer was about ready to kill someone. "Demons." he mumbled under his breath. "Why did I think making them was a good idea?"

They were definitely worse than he remembered. The first demons, the ones he had personally corrupted, had been greatly more intelligent than the ones he was currently dealing with. But that was the problem; they were all dead or missing. The Winchesters had killed Lilith, Asteroth, Alistair, and even Azazel who had been one of the few Angels to survive the heavenly war. Damn those Winchesters. And on top of all that, his hell knights were gone, dead believe it or not. But no one seemed to know exactly how they all died; which was beyond irritating.

It seemed that the only competent demons around anymore were Meg and Crowley. Crowley had been Lilith's second in command and had actually done a pretty good job of filling her shoes. Meg was Azazel's daughter and it seemed she had learned all of his tricks, and she had studied torture under Alistair.

But the rest were cannon fodder; easily replaceable. He could barely stand being in the same room as them; honestly they were worse than the humans. He was counting the days until he could exterminate the whole lot of them.

Lucifer was snapped back to the present by a knock at the door. "Come in." he called.

Meg walked into his office. "Operation Takeover is underway." She declared.

Operation Takeover was the brainchild of Crowley. You have demons possess key players in major cities and let them cause havoc. Meg had chosen the targets; mayors, state legislature, and emergency services had all been possessed. Most major cities in first world countries had all been hit. But for some reason New York City had remained untouched.

"Meg." He began. "Is there any reason that we left New York City out of Operation Takeover?"

A flash of panic crossed her face. No one liked to upset the boss. "Umm, yes actually, there's a hunter who's based solely in New York City."

"So?" Lucifer asked lazily. "He's just a human."

But Meg was shaking her head. "This one's a different breed."

Lucifer was suddenly interested. "How so?"

"It's a family." Meg explained. "They've been based in New York longer than anyone can remember; and they run the city behind the scenes. They make sure all of the monsters living in New York stay away from the humans; but at the same time make sure that they have food. They even have a certain influence over the police and the mafia. But they don't tolerate any demons. Every time we've tried to put any demons in the city, we find them dead."

"Have you tried recently?" Lucifer asked.

Meg thought about it. "The last time was a few months ago. Lilith asked Alistair to go into New York while the Queen of Britain was visiting the U.N. She wanted him to kill the Queen as one of the 66 Seals. Alistair took a team of five demons with him. Alistair said that when they had moved in for the hit against the Queen she was there. She killed the first two demons before anyone knew what was happening. The other three smoked out before she could kill them. Then when Alistair tried to kill her she disarmed him, sent him sprawling across the room, and then she criticized his weapons technique. She gave Alistair a warning to stay out of New York and left."

Lucifer was intrigued. A human who could hold their own against Alistair? Meg was right, these were no ordinary humans. "I still want you to get people on the ground in New York." Lucifer thought back to the newspaper Liz had given him, and the article he had read about gang violence. "They're having a problem with the gangs in that city. Have demons possess the gang leaders. Those humans are as bad as demons anyway, people might not notice the difference." Lucifer thought a moment. "I want all information we have on this family. Maybe there'll be something in there that we can use to take care of this hunter problem."

Meg nodded. "Right away sir." She headed out the door.

"Oh, Meg, what did you say that family's name was again?" Lucifer called after her.

"The Holloways." Meg called back.

Holloway, wasn't that Liz's last name? Coincidence, Lucifer told himself. Just a coincidence.

Meg brought back a hard drive with all the information on it, and left.

At first Lucifer was annoyed that she didn't just bring it to him in paper; but once he opened it he discovered why. It was a ten-gigabyte file. Based on what Crowley had told him, that was the equivalent of half a library.

He briefly skimmed through the earlier records and what he saw was impressive, for humans. They were Egyptian sorcerers which could explain why everyone found them so formidable. Egyptian magic was among the hardest to master. You had to be born with the ability; and you had to know your limits otherwise you could kill yourself by using too much magic. It was also extremely powerful. If he looked back to his earliest memories he could remember his father's brother, Ra, using Egyptian magic to create new things on Earth.

He skipped to the most recent section of the file. The section contained information on five people, the current generation. Two of them Edward (the father) and Ross (his eldest child) were labeled diseased. The mother, Kathleen, was labeled retired. Lucifer skipped over their files. There were only two active members of the family. One was Morgan. She vanished shortly after her father's and brother's death; but she popped up every now and again, buying artifacts.

The other active member was Elizabeth. The picture confirmed that it was indeed the Elizabeth Holloway he had met. The file also confirmed that she was the one who defeated Alistair. There was so much information on Liz, probably because she was a busy human. There was a police report, linking her to half a dozen art thefts; but there was never enough evidence to arrest her. But despite this, it seemed that Elizabeth Holloway was actually a good person. She volunteered at soup kitchens and animal shelters, she ran programs for kids at local libraries, and she donated blood every six months to Red Cross. She was so righteous; she could give some of his brothers a run for their money. She also worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Which he found funny, an art thief working at an art museum. The file said that she was close with her third cousin, Dante, who was in charge of one of the crime families located in Manhattan. It said that she was also close with another cousin, Raymond W. Kelly, the police commissioner in New York. You had to give the girl credit. She had control almost the whole city through the police and the mafia. The file also mentioned that she was on good terms with the monsters that lived in the city. Under notable associates were Lyall Belua (the leader of the local werewolf/skinwalker pack), Daphne Howitzer (the leader of the local vampire nest), and Joran Fastblade (the local Oberon, or king of the elves and fae).

However, her file doesn't have any listed contacts in any gang networks in the city, so Operation Takeover could work.

There was a lot more information in the file; namely her achievements. Even he had to admit, her accomplishments were impressive. She burned down the Fortress of Nyx. Michael had been afraid to even go near the Fortress of Nyx. She had accomplished other things just like that.

And then as the devil was reading through the hunter's file, it happened. The event that changed everything. And it was prayer.

The devil received a prayer.

Lucifer was shocked; he had never received a prayer from someone before. Why would anyone pray to him? "No normal person would ever pray to me." Lucifer thought.

But of the all the adjectives that could be used to describe Elizabeth Holloway 'normal' was not one of them. "Lucifer, who art probably plotting to destroy heaven, umm, you threw Mars threw a wall, which normally is frowned upon but since he was on the verge of starting an inter-pantheon war, I guess I should thank you. So, thank you. You don't have to respond, I just wanted to let you know the gesture was appreciated. So, umm by."

Lucifer was in turmoil. Elizabeth had sent him the prayer. But she was human. The sum of everything he despised. But then again she had helped him, and not freaked out on him when they found out he was the devil. And, Lucifer had to admit, if only to himself, he had been impressed while reading her file. Should he respond? Lucifer thought it over for a few minutes before he decided.

He decided that he should.

He appeared in front of Liz's door. He raised his hand to knock and then hesitated, plagued by doubts. Then before he could talk himself out of it he knocked on the door.

Liz opened it. She looked slightly surprised to see him. "Lucifer, I didn't expect you to come."

"Oh" he said not sure how to respond. "If you want, I can leave."

"No, it's fine come in." She turned and went back into the apartment. Lucifer followed her.

She led him to the dining room. There was a pizza box on the counter, and Lucifer realized he caught her in the middle of dinner.

"Sit" she told him. "I'll get you a plate." She turned and went into the kitchen.

"Well what am I supposed to do now? This was a bad idea, a really bad idea." Lucifer thought.

She came back with a plate and served him a slice. "Angels don't need to eat." He told her.

"I don't care if you don't need to eat, if you disturb me at dinnertime you are obligated to." Liz declared.

"Okay." Lucifer picked up his slice and stared at it as if it might attack him. He then took a small tentative bite. He chewed the piece carefully. "It tastes… strange." Lucifer stated after a moment.

"Good strange, or bad strange? Liz asked.

"Good, I think." He took another bite. "Yeah, good."

"You act like you've never eaten anything before." Liz said, amused.

Lucifer didn't say anything. "My goodness, you really haven't had food before?"

"Angels don't need to eat." he repeated.

"Well then I insist you stay for desert." Liz smiled.

"I couldn't…" Lucifer began.

"Did you not hear the part where I insisted? You're staying, and that's final."

"Alright then if you insist." Lucifer relented.

"I do insist."

Lucifer caught himself smiling. "Stop it." He told himself.

"But I kind of doubt you came here to eat." She said.

"Yeah." He thought about what he wanted to say. "You prayed to me."

"I am aware of that."

"It's just, no one's ever done that before…" he trailed off.

"I wanted to thank you. You made my life a hell of a lot easier when you threw Mars through that wall, and it's not like I had your number."

"So can I ask, why did you come here?" Liz asked. "Shouldn't you be out causing death and destruction?"

"Well to tell you the truth, I'm a little sick of demons at the moment." Lucifer admitted.

"But you created demons." Liz pointed out.

"Yeah but I've been locked in the cage for eons and not many of the original demons are left. And these new ones are stupid as rocks. They can't plan, can just barely follow orders, and are constantly messing things up."

Liz smirked. "Sounds like demons."

She smiled at him, and he got a strange feeling in his stomach. "If you're done then I'll get dessert."

He mentally berated himself. "She's human." He told himself. "She's human and soon she'll be dead."

"Chocolate chip cookies." She said setting down a tray.

"Thanks" he said taking one and nibbling at it. "I umm, had a look at your file."

She raised an eyebrow at him. "I have a file?"

"Yeah. Can I ask why?"

"Why what?" she asked, confused.

"You do all those charity things. You're more righteous than some Angels, and believe me I know. You strive to help humanity even though you're all broken. Why do you bother?"

Liz looked out the window, thinking. "You're right, we're broken. Politicians don't care about the public, people are persecuted because of who they are, and the whole system is so broken that most people don't even realize that it is. But I help. I help because I can't go and find every corrupt politician and force him out of office, I can't rid the world of prejudice. So I do this, because this is what I can do. And because I believe humanity can get better."

"The world is ending in a matter of months, yet you still believe that humanity can change?"

"If I don't, what do I have to believe in?" Liz said. "How about you?"

"Me?" Lucifer asked confused.

"You're going to destroy the world, with the help of demons. Creatures you can't stand. Why? To prove a point, to get revenge over events that happened thousands of years ago? Why not just let it go?"

"You don't know what it's like, to have a sibling betray you!" Lucifer snapped.

Liz raised an eyebrow at him. "Obviously that file of yours is missing information."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Lucifer asked, his anger fading away to curiosity.

"It means." She said softly. "You're not the only one who's been betrayed by an older sibling; and you're not the only one whose lost nearly everything because of it."

Lucifer felt slightly empathetic toward the human. "Was it Morgan?" He asked.

She nodded.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know."

"People always say that they're sorry." Liz shook her head. "Why are you sorry? It's not your fault."

"I'm sorry because I was insensitive." Lucifer said. He knew that if anyone had ever talked to him like that he would have smote them.

"Well then, apology accepted." A ghost of a smile graced her lips.

"Well I should go." Lucifer said.

"Goodbye." She said, and there was a sense of finality about the words.

"Goodbye." He said back.

He knew that this was a final goodbye. They wouldn't be seeing each other again.

So he took off and he found himself standing atop the Willis Tower in Chicago. Lucifer surveyed the city. "Right, then." He said to no one in particular. "Death and destruction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To clear up any discrepancies:
> 
> Azazel reveals that Meg is his daughter in Season 1 episode 22 "Devil's Trap."
> 
> Asteroth appears in Season 2 episode 9 "Malleus Maleficarum."
> 
> In Egyptian Mythology Ra is the one who created the universe out of chaos, so in this story I have it so Ra and God are brothers, and they built creation together.


	4. Chapter 4

It had been two days since Lucifer had visited Liz; and ever since then things had been quiet. It was as if the city was holding its breath. But for what Liz had no idea, so was stuck waiting for disaster to strike.

Then there was a knock at the door. Liz touched the blade hidden in her jacket to reassure herself. She approached the door and looked cautiously through the peephole. When she saw who it was her face relaxed into a smile.

"Chester Lionel DouglasMacArthur!" she half shouted as she opened the door.

Chester Lionel Douglas MacArthur was Lyall Belua's nephew and poised to become the next alpha if Lyall ever stepped down as pack leader or died. In spite of this Lionel (only Liz called him that, most people called him Douglas) was pretty easy-going. He was one of the few people Liz counted a true friend.

"Why do you do that?" Lionel asked as he stepped into the apartment.

"Do what?" Liz asked him.

"Say Douglas and MacArthur as one word."

Liz grinned to herself. They'd had this conversation many times. "Because that's the only proper way to say it."

"But no one else says it like that." He protested.

"Cause' they all say it wrong." Liz explained.

"Yeah, because everyone who's ever said my name is wrong, except for you." Lionel replied sarcastically.

Liz nodded. "Yup, that's right." She then laughed at the expression that crossed Lionel's face. "Every time." she thought.

Before he could respond and continue the argument Liz said; "Is there a reason you came to see me, or did you just come to argue about your name."

Lionel immediately got excited. In the space of a few seconds he went from moody and sullen to energetic and excited. Lionel could act so mature that sometimes she had to remind herself that he was only seventeen.

"We got word from Randy." Lionel said. Randy was a skin walker who had been placed undercover in one of the gangs by Lyall, at Liz's request. She had thought that it might be good to know what was going on in the gangs, to make sure that nothing supernatural was happening there.

"He says demons have infiltrated one of the gangs. Can you believe it? Actual live demons here in New York." Lionel was practically bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Liz wasn't as excited. Demons just destroyed; there was no rhyme or reason to it, they just did. If there were demons in town they had to be dealt with quickly, before bodies started dropping.

"Do you have details?" Liz asked quickly.

Lionel nodded. "Randy says they possessed the leader and two lieutenants in the gang and that they'll meet at this abandoned building later today." He said all this in one breath.

"Address?" Liz asked.

He told her the address. Then looked at her as if he wanted to ask her something. Liz thought she knew what was coming and sighed inwardly. "Well? Out with it, what do you want?"

"Can I come with you?" he blurted suddenly.

"Lionel, you're seventeen."

"So? You had your first fight with chaos demons when you were fifteen. And I've heard you swear that chaos demons are harder to fight then demons from hell."

"If I take you with me and you even stub a toe, Lyall will have a conniption."

"Please" he begged. "How am I ever supposed to learn how to fight if I never get to see any action?"

Liz sighed. Lionel was right. Lyall was overprotective; she had told him so herself, several times. She had been working the streets since she was fourteen. "Okay, you can come."

"Yes!" He punched the air.

"On one condition." She told him, cutting short his celebration. "You do what I tell you; if I say run you run as fast as your little legs will carry you. If I tell you to leave me and save yourself, you do it."

Lionel had turned completely serous. "Do you think these demons might be able to defeat you? He asked.

"I'm not worried about a few demons; I'm worried that this might be a trap." Liz said.

Lionel shook his head. "You are so paranoid."

"Yes." She agreed. "And that's why I'm still alive."

Lucifer was in a good mood. Things had been running smoothly with Operation Takeover, all the other beasts had been running hunters ragged, and Michael hadn't gotten his vessel to say yes yet and probably never would. He smirked and put his feet up on his desk. Things were looking up.

His thoughts were interrupted by a knock at the door. "Come in." he called.

Meg walked in with a nervous expression on her face. He could tell that whatever had brought her to his office wasn't good.

"I have an update on Operation Takeover in New York." She announced. She handed him a manila envelope.

He opened it and pulled out a picture of a crime scene. There were three dead bodies lying next to each other; and spray painted at their feet in large black letters was the message "STAY OUT OF NEW YORK." It took him a minute but he realized that the dead men were the gang leaders he had sent demons to possess.

"And I was having such a good day." He sighed. "Suspects?"

"It was Holloway." Meg said. "No one else would do something like this."

"I'm going for a walk." Lucifer declared, standing up and walking out of the room.

"Where are you going?" She asked, but Lucifer didn't answer; he was already gone.

Lucifer appeared in Liz's dining room. She was making dinner. He cleared his throat to get her attention, and she whirled around in alarm.

"What the hell!" Liz exclaimed. "What the actual freaking hell!"

Lucifer tilted his head to the side in confusion. "What?"

"Dude." She said, much calmer now that she saw who it was. "There is this thing, it's called knocking. You're supposed to do it before you go into someone else's home. I mean, I get you were locked in hell for thousands of years but that's no excuse for…"

"You killed my demons." He said coolly, interrupting her tirade.

"Yeah, so?" She asked, slightly smirking.

Lucifer began to get angry. "So, you aren't allowed to do that!"

The smile disappeared. "Listen hell boy, if you didn't want me to kill your demons, you shouldn't have sent them to New York!"

"Hell boy?" Lucifer sputtered.

"Yeah, and I'll tell you what else, I won't tolerate a demonic presentence in this city! So back off New York!" She snapped.

"Or else what?" He snapped back.

"Or else I'll consider hell an active threat to this city. Tell me hell boy, in my file does it say what happened to the fortress of Nyx?"

"Yeah, I know what happened to it." She had razed it.

"Good, because I'm not negotiating here; and if you don't stay away I'll do the same thing to hell."

He had to back off New York otherwise Liz would obliterate hell. But Lucifer couldn't just leave; he felt he had to salvage some of his dignity. "If I say I'll leave New York alone, you'll stay out of my other operations."

"Sure, I don't care about your fucking apocalypse, as long as it stays out of New York."

"You're willing to let me destroy the rest of the world, as long as I stay out of New York? Why? What's so special about New York?'

Liz sneered at him. "Like I'd tell you."

"Fine, whatever. Now that we're both on the same page I'll take my leave now." And he left before she could say another word.


	5. Chapter 5

It had been a week since Lucifer had last seen Liz. He was still fuming about it. She hadn't even been scared of him. When he had pushed, Liz had gotten right in his face and pushed back. She had even threatened him. Which, if he was honest to himself, was probably the only reason he hadn't tried to kill her. He found her courage amiable. When he yelled, criticized, or threatened anyone they just took it; they let him walk all over them. But not Elizabeth Holloway. Maybe if she survived the first part of the apocalypse he would find out what made her like that.

He got up and looked out his window. He relocated his office every week just to be safe. Right now they were in an apartment building in New Jersey; they had the entire third floor to themselves. New York City was just across the water. Lucifer told himself that it was just a coincidence that Crowley had picked that place. It probably was, but with that demon you couldn't be sure of anything.

Lucifer stared out the window and up at the clouds. He wondered what Michael was doing; but then he shook himself out of it. Michael was his enemy, and soon they would fight to the death. But Lucifer couldn't tear his eyes away from the sky. Of course he knew that heaven wasn't really up there; it was a pocket dimension known to him as the duat; but it was the principle of the thing.

The acrid smell of plastic burning tore him from his thoughts. Lucifer shook his head. "Demons." He muttered aloud. They probably had set another couch on fire. Sometimes they could act like such children.

He marched out into the hallway ready to kill whoever had set the fire; only to stop dead in his tracts. Half the hallway was on fire. But the scary thing was that there was no sound. With normal fire, holy fire even, you could hear the fire crackling. But he could only smell the scent of burning plaster and feel the heat. "Fiendfyre" Lucifer gasped. He turned and ran down the hallway fire licking at his heels.

Fiendfyre was cursed flame. It was one of the few things that could kill him. The last time he had seen it was in the war against Apophis. Raphael had fallen in it and it had nearly killed him; and his wings had been permanently scarred.

Lucifer reached out with grace to see if he could identify who had launched the attack. When he felt the energies of who had done this his blood ran cold. Chaos demons. They were supposed to be trapped in the deepest level of the duat, in the sea of chaos. What the hell were they doing on Earth?

But he couldn't focus on that right now. He had to try to get out of the building that was slowly turning to ashes.

Lucifer ran down the stairs to the second floor and came face-to-face with a chaos demon. Lucifer didn't hesitate. He had his blade out instantaneously and ran the demon through. He adjusted his grip on his blade as he saw more chaos demons approaching.

Lucifer didn't wait for the demons to come to him; he launched himself at them so he would have the momentum. He stabbed the first one through the throat, and then he deflected the stab the second one took at him and returned one of his own. He kicked the third one in the knees and he heard bone shatter. When the demon fell over Lucifer kicked its head in. The fourth one was smarter. It struck when Lucifer was distracted finishing the third one. It slashed at him; and while Lucifer managed to jump back and avoid the worst of the strike, it opened a deep cut across his sword arm before backing away out of his reach.

The blades of creatures of chaos were made with a special kind of black magic that it made even his skin crawl. The blades were made of corrupted celestial metals. They came in all shapes and sizes, but they were all a dark red and carried chaos magic within them. When the demon's blade cut open his arm chaos magic danced across his skin and pain wracked through his arm, making him nearly drop his blade. The demon advanced toward him again but stopped suddenly, his face extorting into an expression of confusion. The demon fell to the floor, a stab wound in his back.

Elizabeth Holloway smirked at him, brandishing a bloody blade. "Fancy meeting you here."

"Liz?" he asked.

"That's my name, don't wear it out." She smirked.

"What are you doing here?" He asked.

"Fighting chaos demons. I found out they were massing here, and didn't like how close they were to my city." Liz explained.

There was suddenly an ominous creak, and Liz made a face at the sound. "Well, if you don't want the floor to collapse out under you or to be burned to death; I suggest you come with me."

Lucifer did want to live, so he followed. They ran down the corridor; only pausing when demons ran at them, weapons barred. Lucifer had to admire her fighting skills. She was just as fast as he was, although their fighting styles were different. They made an efficient team; it's a shame that she was human.

After fighting a particularly vicious group of demons, Lucifer studied her blade. It looked almost like an angel blade, except it was black as coal. It had to be one of the celestial metals because only those types of metals could kill chaos demons. However celestium (The metal in archangel blades) and principalitis (the metal in regular angel blades) are both silver.

"What is your blade made of?" Lucifer asked her.

"Hmm? Oh, it's made of stygian." She answered.

Memories came flooding back to him. His father and his uncles welding black blades as they fought oncoming hordes of chaos demons. Lucifer shook his head and focused on the present. He barely remembered the war against chaos, he had only been a fledgling when it had happened; and what he did remember wasn't pleasant.

"Is there any particular reason why you're so interested in my sword?" She asked.

"My father had a similar weapon." Lucifer said, the word 'father' stiff and unfamiliar in his mouth.

"Well I'm not using god's sword."

"No, his was longer and thicker." Lucifer smirked at her.

Then they heard a scream. "Help!" The speaker sounded like a little kid.

Liz's eyes widened. She started after the voice. "Come on!" She called after him.

Lucifer sighed. He didn't really understand why they were running after someone else when they could be escaping the deadly blaze themselves, but he ran after her anyway. They came to the end of a hallway. Liz kicked a door down and strode into the room, Lucifer only a few steps behind her. On one of the beds in the room there were two kids; a young boy that was four or five and a girl who was around seven, who looked slightly familiar to him.

The girl put her arms around her brother. "Who are you?" she asked protectively.

"It's okay sweetheart, we're here to help you." Liz soothed.

The girl nodded. Liz sheathed her blade and picked up the boy who, Lucifer realized with a jolt, had been silently crying. Liz nodded at the girl, silently telling him to pick her up. He sheathed his own blade and moved toward the girl to pick her up. When he did he realized what looked so familiar about her. She looked a little like Gabriel's first vessel; of course Gabriel's vessel had been older, but the resemblance was there. Coincidence, perhaps. But there had been way too many coincidences of late for them to actually be coincidence.

"Luci!" Liz's voice snapped him back to reality. "Hello, building on fire; we need to get out!"

"I know, I'm coming." Lucifer said. "And don't call me Luci."

She smirked at him. "All right then, hell boy." Then she turned and walked out of the room before he could think of a decent comeback.

He rolled his eyes and walked out of the room after her.

They ran back down the hallway toward the stairs. The fire blazing around them; but for some reason there was a relatively clear pathway right through the heart of the flames letting them through. Which made him nervous; if there was an enemy tying to lead them into a trap they were walking right into it, and their weapons were sheathed because they were carrying the kids.

Suddenly there the building gave a loud groan; and the ceiling collapsed. Lucifer darted forward while Liz jerked backwards. To his great relief the floor beneath them somehow held. But then Lucifer heard the boy start sobbing.

Lucifer felt his stomach churn. Was she…

"Liz! Liz, are you okay" he shouted

"I'm fine!" She called. "I was hit but some debris, but it's nothing serious."

"Okay, do you want me to clear a path for you?" Lucifer asked.

"No! The floor's unstable. I want you to get out of here and take her to one of the ambulances outside."

"What about you?" Lucifer questioned.

"I'll find my own way out." She replied. "Now go."

Lucifer turned and ran towards the stairwell. The flames danced around him as if they were a hungry beast, ready to eat him alive. But he pulled the girl tight against his chest and ran. The path through the flames he had noticed before was still there and he followed it; down the stairs and through the lobby, and out the front doors. He didn't stop running until he got to one of the ambulances. The paramedics swarmed around them. The girl was taken from his arms. He was escorted onto one of the ambulances where one of the paramedics began to sew up the cut on his arm.

From the back of the ambulance he stared anxiously at the burning building; hoping against hope that she would make it out. Even though he was mad at himself for doing so. She was human. The very thing he was trying to exterminate. Why did he care so much about her?

After a while he came to the conclusion that it was because they fought together. One of the first lessons Michael had drilled into him was that you fight for the person fighting next to you; no matter who that person is. They had teamed up for this; it was his duty to be concerned for her until this fight was over. That was it. End of story. He wasn't making excuses to himself.

After what he estimated to be ten minutes, he had nearly given up hope. He was sitting on the curb next to the ambulance where he had been treated; he was wearing a shock blanket, they had insisted he wear it. He turned to the EMT who had attended him. "Do you think anyone in there could still be alive?" He asked.

She gave him a pitying look. "I'm sorry; anyone in there is probably dead. Not even a miracle could have helped anyone to have survived this long."

Well at least she didn't give him false hope. "It's fine." He told her.

"Did you have a friend in there?" she asked him.

How could he describe his relationship with Elizabeth Holloway? She had patched him up when he fell from the Empire State Building, gave him his first taste of food, threatened him when it had been his intention to go and threaten her, then fought with him and helped him get out of a burning building. "Yeah, she was my friend."

The EMT gave him another pitying look but left him alone.

The girl he had carried out of the building walked up to him followed closely by two adults he took to be her parents. "Thank you for saving me." She said solemnly. Then she hugged him.

A kind of warmness touched his grace. He felt… accomplished. Maybe that wasn't the best word for it but he suddenly got why Liz had wanted to save them. The knowledge that she is going to go on and live her life because he saved her made him feel like a better person then he actually was. Lucifer told himself that it doesn't matter, she would probably be dead in a few weeks anyway.

Her parents approached. "We can't thank you enough." The dad told him.

"It's fine, you don't have to thank me." He told them.

"But we really do." The mother glanced anxiously back at the fire. "Did you by any chance see our son?"

"My friend had him, but we got separated and she's still in there." Lucifer gestured toward the building. "The EMT's said not even a miracle could have kept them alive for this long."

Luckily for the two parents Elizabeth Holloway had never been dependent on miracles.

All of the sudden one of the windows on the first floor blew out, and Liz climbed out of it carrying the boy. The mother cried out in relief. "That's my son, HEY, my son is alive!"

Liz slowly limped toward the mother. She looked terrible. Her left leg was covered in blood, and she was coated in ash. She handed the child to his mother. "I believe this is your son." She deadpanned."

She sat down on the curb next to Lucifer. "Did you miss me?" she asked him quietly. Lucifer fought the bizarre urge to laugh.

Liz wasn't seriously injured; she only had a small gash on her leg that would heal completely by the end of the month. Lucifer sat with her while the EMT sewed up her leg. After she was done the EMT left. Neither of them said anything for a while.

Finally Liz leaned forward and asked. "Why'd you stay?"

"What?" Lucifer asked, confused.

"After you got out of the building you could have left, just flown away and I wouldn't have been surprised; so why didn't you?"

Lucifer fought for a second. "When I was young I was taught that you fight for the person fighting next to you. We fought together, so it's my job to look after you until the fight is over."

"Did God say that?" Liz asked.

"No, my brother Michael did." Lucifer told her. "Did you notice that in the building the flames parted to form a kind of path?"

"Oh, yeah; that was me." Liz told him. "I'm a pyromancer."

Lucifer looked at her surprised. "I didn't know that."

"What you don't know about me could fill several books." She smirked at him. Then she got up and carefully tested her weight on the injured leg. She briefly stumbled but Lucifer got up and caught her before she could fall. "Thanks." She muttered, as she regained her balance.

"Why couldn't I sense you in there? Lucifer asked as another question occurred to him. "Before I searched with my grace to see who set the fire, I didn't sense you and I should have. Why couldn't I?"

Liz tugged at the edge of her leather jacket. "My jacket's warded. It's so people won't be able to sense me when I'm trying to stay undiscovered."

Lucifer nodded. He supposed that made sense.

Liz stood up. "I've got to go." She smirked at him again, but this time it was less of a smirk and more of a smile. "I'll see you around, hell boy." Then she walked away and melted into the crowd.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've mentioned the duat in this chapter. I think I should explain what it means in this story. So the duat is a pocket dimension to the Earth. The first layer of the duat is semi-imposed on the Earth. Special humans, pagans, angels, and all types of demons can see into it. It's where a person exists in their true form. Humans appear as souls, demons appear in a form that looks like their original human shape but scarred from years of torture, and angels are pure grace. The rest of the duat is made up of different levels. Like on one level is heaven, one is hell, another is Oz, purgatory, Asgard, and plenty more.
> 
> All right I know I already said that Ra and God are brothers in this 'verse, and yeah that's true but I've decided to expand the family so that Death and Apophis are also their brothers. Death and God are the oldest; not even they know who is older. Then there is Apophis, and the baby of that family is Ra. When God and Ra started to shape creation Apophis didn't like it and told them to stop but they didn't listen. Death wanted no part in this and just left the matter alone. Eventually Apophis had enough with this creation thing and decided to put an end to it. So he created his own army (the chaos demons) and attacked with the intent to destroy everything his brothers had built. The regular angels hadn't even been created yet. But Ra had already created the Egyptian pagans (Who had since been around for a while; some of them were older than Raphael) and they went to war to protect creation. Even Death helped God and Ra to defeat Apophis. Eventually God and Death forced Ra to lock Apophis in the deepest level of the duat; the sea of chaos, which was last remnant of what things were before creation. But Ra hadn't wanted to do that because he had been really close to Apophis. So Ra decides he doesn't want to even talk to his other brothers because of what they made him do. He goes back to Egypt and eventually gives the throne to Osiris before vanishing for good, and no one's seen him since.


	6. Chapter 6

Elizabeth Holloway was many things; a hunter, a guardian, a sorceress, a knight, a thief, a con artist, an actual artist, a Harvard graduate with two PhD's.

But right now she was bored.

She had made sure that the lycanthropes would stop mugging tourists (because she had seriously had enough complaints from the NYPD), finished her project on the movement of light (Royce had been nagging her to finish that for weeks now, those NASA jerks were demanding little bitches), the project to install celestium plating on the Empire State Building was finally finished (even though she had very little to do with the actual installation process, she had just drawn the plans), and she didn't have to go into work today (her work at the museum was more part time; she was only called in to authenticate, restore, or classify artifacts).

Liz had absolutely nothing to do. She considered getting up to find her sketch book and draw something. But she lacked the motivation to do anything.

Maybe the problem was that Liz was finding it harder and harder to find a reason to do anything. Maybe it was PSTD; her brother and father's death, the fortress of Nyx, the Battle of Tara, and so many other events finally catching up to her. It also probably didn't help that on top of all that she had a history of childhood dysfunction; her father had been abusive and controlling.

Then there was the sound of scratching at the door. Liz got up and opened the door smiling at her visitor. "Hey Jacks, how've you been?" she asked the gigantic black lab standing in the hallway.

Jacks was one of three animals that showed up on Liz's door way every now and then. There were two black cats Selina and Leo; and there was Jacks. You rarely saw all three of them in the same place at the same time, and that only happened when Liz was in trouble.

The other animals showed up for various reasons but Jacks usually showed up when she needed a friend, like now.

Jacks walked into the apartment and licked Liz's hand. "Hey Liz. Could we go for a walk? It's been a while since you took me for a walk."

Liz crouched down so she was level with Jacks. "You do realize that you can go for a walk by yourself." Liz tells him, hiding a smile.

Jacks licked Liz's face. "Yeah, but if you come we can get pizza. Joe won't give me a slice unless you're there. Also I won't have to worry about someone calling Animal Control."

"Okay, I could go for some pizza." Liz gave in. She had already eaten today so she really didn't need to eat; but she didn't know when Jacks had eaten last. "I'll go get the leash."

Liz got up and pulled on her leather jacket, and then she got the leash off the counter and clipped it around Jacks' collar. All the while he was excitedly yapping.

"Calm down." Liz told him.

"Fine, killjoy." He said as he dragged her out the door. "Let's go!"

He continued to half-drag her until they got outside. Then he walked nicely. Liz shook her head at this. He did it every time.

It was only a five minute walk to Joe's. Considering this was New York, it wasn't far at all. They were almost there when some guy plowed into her.

"Hey! Watch where you're going." She yelled at him. But then he turned around, and she noticed who it was. "Lucifer?" She was shocked.

"Liz?" he was just as surprised. "What are you doing here?"

"I live here. My apartment is only a few blocks away." She raised an eyebrow at him. "I think a better question is: what are you doing here."

"I was umm…"

"Are you stalking me?" she asked suddenly.

"What?! No!"

Jacks sniffed Lucifer's shoe and growled. Dogs were great at sensing supernatural presences, and Lucifer was a pretty powerful presence.

Lucifer looked down at Jacks with a little surprise; like he hadn't noticed he was there.

"Down, Jacks." Liz told him. Then she turned to Lucifer. "No, really; what are you doing in New York?"

"I just needed to clear my head." He looked around anxiously. "Hey can we talk somewhere else?"

"Sure." Liz agreed. "We can go to…"

"Joe's" Jacks interrupted.

"What?" Lucifer asked.

"Look man." Jacks said to Lucifer. "Maybe angels don't need to eat, but you see, I do have to eat and Joe makes the best pizza in town. I don't care that you're the freaking devil; you are not interfering with my lunch."

Lucifer looked at Jacks in disbelief; while Liz was doing her best not to laugh. "You want to walk with us?" Liz asked.

"Sure." Lucifer glanced at Jacks and then back to Liz. "That's an interesting dog you have there."

Jacks snorted. "That dog is standing right here; and would appreciate it if you didn't talk about him like he isn't here."

Liz faked a cough to cover her snigger. Lucifer had tilted his head in confusion, making him look like a little lost lamb. It was adorable. "Come on, it's not like we have all day." She told them. Which was a lie, she had nothing to do, and the disbelieving look Jacks gave her clearly said he knew it too.

When they finally got there, they were greeted enthusiastically by Joe. "Miss. Holloway!" he kissed both her cheeks. "It's always a pleasure to have you here."

He knelt down and patted Jack's head. "And of course it's always a pleasure to see Jacks as well."

Jacks scoffed. "Oh really? If I'm such of pleasure then how come you never give me pizza when I come in here alone?" But Joe was a vampire and couldn't understand animals.

Then Joe turned to Lucifer. "And who is this?"

"Oh umm this is my friend Luke Deville." Liz said quickly. She winced inwardly. Luke Deville? Really? That was the best she could come up with? She might as well have introduced him as Lucifer the devil.

But fortunately Joe didn't make the connection. He just smiled and shook Lucifer's hand. "Any friend of Liz is a friend of mine."

"Umm yeah it's uhh great to meet you." Lucifer said awkwardly. Oh, the poor boy had the social skills of a rock.

"Can I get you anything?" Joe asked.

"Yeah" Liz answered. "Three slices to go, please."

When Joe left to go serve her order Lucifer turned to her. "You didn't have to do that." He mumbled.

She smirked at him. "I've already told you; if you disturb me while I'm eating you are obligated to eat with me."

Lucifer shrugged but didn't say anything.

"Can we go to Central Park?" Jacks asked.

"Fine with me." Liz shrugged. She glanced at Lucifer "Is it okay with you?"

"Yeah, it's fine." Lucifer said.

They got their pizza and went to the park. They sat down on one of the benches to eat. Jacks wolfed down his slice in thirty seconds, which had to be a new record.

Liz let go of jack's leash and he roamed around, exploring. Every once in a while he would glance back at them to make sure they were okay, then go back to whatever he was doing. Liz smiled as she watched him.

Lucifer hadn't said a word since Joe's. The silence between them was verging on uncomfortable, full of all the things that they weren't saying.

"So." Liz began, "You never did answer my question."

"What question?" he asked.

"Why are you in New York?" She asked.

"Demons can be… difficult. I occasionally feel the need to get some fresh air, clear my head."

"There isn't a lot of fresh air in New York." Liz smirked.

"Yeah well, it was random choice. I choose the first place that comes to mind and go."

"So you're saying it's just a coincidence that I keep running into you?" Liz asked.

"Well it must be." Lucifer said and Liz scoffed at that. "What, you think I'm stalking you?" Lucifer demanded.

Liz spread her hands out indicating that it was a possibility she had considered.

"I'm not stalking you!" Lucifer protested.

"Well we've met three times 'accidentally'" She said, making quotation gestures around the last word. "Once is a stranger, twice is coincidence, three times is a tail."

"Well it is a coincidence. I'm not tailing you." He seethed.

Liz held up her hands in a gesture of surrender. "Okay then."

They sat in silence again for a while. "Why are you here?" she asked suddenly.

Lucifer looked at her in confusion. "I mean, you hate humans. That's what the whole point of the apocalypse is. You trying to kill all of the humans, right?" Liz elaborated. "So why are you sitting here talking with me."

Lucifer looked at her. "You're different."

She gave a short laugh. The devil was a comedian. "I'm really not."

He studied her with his blue eyes. "Yes you are."

They sat like that, in supercharged silence for one moment, two.

He stood up suddenly, breaking the spell. "I should get going. They'll probably be wondering where I am."

Liz nodded. "Alright, goodbye then."

But he was already gone.

Jacks came back over to her. "He's weird."

"Yeah." Liz agreed.

Jacks studied the spot where Lucifer had disappeared. "Gabriel's weirder." He decided.

Liz smirked at that. "Gabriel's weirder than everybody, that's not saying much."

Jacks looked up at her. "No you're weirder then everybody."

Jacks pranced away, pleased with himself.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah Liz can speak animal. In Egyptian lore, some magicians could speak to animals. That just fit in well with the story.


	7. Chapter 7

Liz was working at one of the local libraries. She was running an abstract art program for 5-10 year olds. Basically they were splashing paint on a gigantic canvas. Now normally any projects with paint got messy; but this one really took the cake. One of the kids had gotten the idea to put paint on their feet then walk across the canvass. Liz's first policy was to never discourage creativity so she had said yes.

The parents would probably be less than thrilled but Liz didn't care. She loved working with kids and seeing them come up with out of the box thinking like this. It could bring a rare smile to her face.

She was trying to help one of the kids put paint of her feet; a task made harder by the fact that the girl was very ticklish and kept moving whenever the paint brush touched her foot. Someone else might have gotten frustrated but both of them were smiling.

"Lizzie, is that a smile?" a voice from behind her said. "I don't think I've seen you smile in years."

Liz turned around. It was Gilgamesh.

Gilgamesh was older than most civilizations. Gilgamesh was a warrior prince from the ancient city-state of summer and the people there had loved him (they even wrote a fucking book about him. But Gilgamesh swore that it left out all the good parts and somehow forgot the part where he actually became immortal). He had known the archangels personally and was familiar with some of the lesser angels as well, he was friendly with many pagans around the world, and he had been the first guardian; before the Holloways had taken over the role.

He was also like a second father to Liz. He was the one who had really raised her, Ross, and Morgan.

But they hadn't been close since Ross's death and Morgan's betrayal. Liz had pushed him away; Liz had pushed everyone away. They hadn't even spoken in nearly two years.

"Gil, can we do this later? I'm kind of in the middle of something." Liz said gesturing around her.

"Sure, I'll wait outside" he left the room.

Liz turned back to the kids. "Hey Liz, did you bring the bucket?" One of the kids asked her.

"Yes, of course I brought the bucket. What do you take me for?" She replied.

An hour later Liz left the library with paint on her clothes and a smile on her face. As she started to walk away Gilgamesh fell in step beside her.

"Hello again." He greeted. When Liz didn't say anything he started again. "It's been a while."

"Yeah." She answered. "It has been."

Gilgamesh looked at her sadly. Liz figured he was remembering the person she used to be. But that was before. This was now.

"Look Liz I know these past few years have been difficult for you…" He began.

"Please can we not do this?" Liz asked. "I'm fine Gilgamesh."

"No Liz, you aren't." He studied her. "Look I know that after our fight, I'm probably the last person you want to talk to."

"Gil, I'm not mad at you. You're the one who's kept your distance, not me." Liz stopped walking and turned to face him. "Is that why you're here? To apologize? Because I forgave you a long time ago."

"No Liz that's not why I'm here." He was silent for a moment, trying to gather his thoughts. "I'm here because you cut everyone out."

Liz rolled her eyes. "Once again, I'm fine"

"No, Liz, you're not" Gilgamesh shook his head. "You can't live like this forever, locked inside your own head. You have to talk to someone Lizzy, you have to let somebody in. I understand if it's not me. But you need to let somebody in."

Liz didn't say anything, and Gilgamesh sighed. "Just think about it, alright?" He turned away and vanished into the crowd.

*SPN*

Lucifer poured the chicken blood into the bowl. The spell was almost complete. Just a few more ingredients.

Lucifer was trying to summon Michael. Lucifer didn't want to fight his brother, and he saw no reason to do it just because of something dad had said thousands of years ago. Maybe Michael felt the same way. Maybe they could come to an agreement of sorts. They didn't have to fight, right?

He added the last ingredient and chanted the enochian spell. Then while he was chanting, he lit a match and dropped it in the bowl.

The magic sparked, than faded. Lucifer shifted from foot to foot, suddenly anxious. What if Michael didn't answer the summons? What if he did?

Then he heard a voice from behind him. "Hello brother."

Lucifer turned. But the other angel was not Michael. "Zachariah." Lucifer said distastefully. "I summoned Michael, not you."

Zachariah sneered at him. "The commander is busy at the moment, if you have a message for him you can give it to me." That was when Lucifer realized that they weren't alone. There were two angels flanking Zachariah and at least five close by. This could get ugly, but Lucifer had no desire to harm his siblings.

Lucifer held up his hands, showing that he was unarmed. "I didn't come here to fight."

Zachariah looked at him in disbelief. "Then why did you summon Michael?"

"I want to talk to him." Lucifer was furious now. Michael just had to send the one angel that always managed to rub him the wrong way. Why couldn't Michael just come himself? Why did Zachariah just assume he had come to kill his brother?

Zachariah laughed. "Why would he talk to you? You forsake us. You openly disobeyed father's will. You want to know why he isn't here? He despises you. If Michael had come he would rip you to shreds here and now."

Conflicting emotions shot through Lucifer's head. He fought them all down and kept his expression neutral. Lucifer forced himself to laugh. "Really, that's the best you've got? If you're done with the pitiful attempts to insult me, I think I'll be going. I came to talk to Michael; not his pet lapdog."

Lucifer left, before he did something stupid like smite them all. He tried to fight back his emotions, but couldn't. Michael despised him; he couldn't even find the respect for his brother to meet him in person. And after everything he had done, maybe he had deserved it. Maybe…

He didn't know where to go; who could he talk to without being branded weak? The answer came to him suddenly.

He landed in the hallway of an apartment complex, and knocked on the door in front of him. Liz opened it, and when she saw him she stared in shock.

"I'm sorry, but I didn't know where else to go."

*SPN*

Liz lying on the couch, mulling over what Gilgamesh had said. 'You have to let someone in.' Well who the hell was she going to talk to?

Then she heard a knock at the door.

She got up and opened it; and found the Devil on her doorstep, looking like a kicked puppy. "I'm sorry, but I didn't know where else to go." He said.

"Come in." He came into the apartment and just stood there in the middle of the room.

"I'm sorry." He said again. "I'm…"

She interrupted him. "Its fine." He looked at her gratefully. She gestured to the couch. "Sit, let me get you a drink."

"Angels can't get drunk." Lucifer said.

She rolled her eyes. She knew this was untrue; she had seen Gabriel completely intoxicated on several different occasions. But Liz reasoned that angels needed something stronger than just regular alcohol. She went over to the counter and pulled out a bottle of Asgardian mead and a glass.

She went back to the table and poured for him. "Drink." She told him.

He eyed the glass warily, but eventually he took a tentative sip. He shuddered as the alcohol went down his throat. The weakest Asgardian mead was about 50% stronger than the strongest mortal alcoholic drink. And this was one of the stronger brands.

"What happened?" She asked.

He took another drink before answering. "I tried to get in contact with Michael."

Liz frowned. "Why?" she asked incredulously.

"I wanted to talk with him." Lucifer grabbed the glass and downed the rest. "I-I don't want to fight him. I wanted to see if- I thought maybe there could be another way."

Liz poured him another drink. "Well you did betray him." she said gently.

"But I didn't!" Lucifer snapped. "I just went to him. I wanted his support. I didn't like the humans that father created. I thought they were a waste. I asked Michael for his support, so we could tell our father together. But he beat me up; called me a freak."

Liz's heart clenched in sympathy. It sounded a little too much like her story. She reached out and put her hand over his. "Did you get into contact with him?"

"No." He took another drink. "He sent Zachariah in his place. The one angel I can't stand and Michael sends him. Ahh, and apparently Michael despises me. He wants to fight." His speech was slightly slurred now.

"I'm sorry." She told him.

"Not your fault." He mumbled, leaning forward and putting his head in his hands.

Liz shook her head at him. Two drinks, and he was already smashed. "And you said angels can't get drunk."

"I'm not drunk." He protested.

She smirked. "Then what do you call this?" She said gesturing to him.

He thought for a moment. "Not drunk." He declared eventually.

Liz chuckled. "Yeah, okay hell boy. Just keep telling yourself that."

They sat in silence for a moment.

"Can I ask you a question?" Liz asked.

"Sure, what?"

"Why did you come here?"

"The demons wouldn't understand. Honestly, I'm counting the days until I can exterminate them. I just remembered you said that a sibling had betrayed you. I just thought, maybe-maybe you'd understand a little of what I'm going through."

Liz studied him sadly. "And they say Angels are emotionless."

Lucifer leaned back against the back of the couch. "Oh, they are. But I-I've always felt more than my siblings have. Don't know why, but…" He trailed off.

"Why do you keep coming back to New York, and talking to me when you hate humans?" Liz asked.

"I already told you; you're different."

"How would you know?" Liz demanded "You barely know me?"

"I don't know." He admitted. "But angel intuition is rarely wrong."

They sat in quiet for a long time. It wasn't until he started snoring that Liz realized he had fallen asleep. She shook her head at him. "Lightweight." She called him, but her tone was a fond one. She got a blanket from the hall closet and draped it over him.

Then she got a text from Lyall. There was a bank robbery a block away. Liz knew from experience that she would probably be out for the rest of the night if she stayed to give a statement; which she generally did (there was no reason to upset the police commissioner, they were poker buddies after all).

She left a note on the counter for Lucifer in case he woke up; she also left him a glass of water and two aspirin for the hangover he would surely have when he woke up.

Then she went out to give those bank robbers what they deserved.

*SPN*

Lucifer woke up with a pounding headache. He looked around in a panic, not knowing where he was. Then the events of last night came back to him. Michael, Liz, intoxication; right.

He stumbled over to the kitchen table. He noticed a folded piece of paper on the table with his name on it. It said:

Lucifer,

If I'm not back; there was a bank robbery a block away. I decided to go stop it. So I'm either in the middle of stopping bank robbers or giving my statement to the police (honestly it's easier to fight armed delinquents than trying to give a statement to the police without hinting about any supernatural elements). I'll be fine, I've dealt with much, much worse. I'd worry more about the bank robbers!

I bet you probably have a terrible headache and feel sick to your stomach. You should take the pills on the table; really they'll help with the headache. You should also eat something. I know you might not feel like it, but it will help. I suggest bacon and eggs. Also coffee isn't a bad idea either. I know that angels 'don't need to eat' but they also 'can't get drunk.' Seriously; bacon, eggs, coffee. It'll work wonders.

See you later,

Liz

Lucifer took the pills she gave him and then set off in search of a diner. Bacon, eggs, coffee; right?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just think that the idea that Asguardians would have stronger alcohol than mortals make sense. They're a society of (nearly) immortal warriors. It just makes sense to me that they have a higher alcohol tolerance, and need stronger drinks.


	8. Chapter 8

It had been two days since Lucifer had come to see Liz; and what was she doing now? She was discussing theoretical physics with a cat. Which might sound weird to most people but it was actually a common occurrence in the Holloway household.

Right now Liz was talking to Selina. Selina usually only came over when she was working on something. Like, for example, a project for NASA or designing a new spell. They had been trying to design wards (physics was very similar to magic) for vampires but the spell had a tendency to decay if used longer than a week, which sucked because long lasting wards had ten times the uses.

They were going over the pros and cons of adding additional power to the wards (pro: it might stop the decay and even increase the power of the wards; con: it might blow up and obliterate anything within a five foot radius) when there was a knock at the door.

Selina looked questioningly at Liz. "Don't look at me, I don't know who it is." Liz said.

Liz went to the door and opened it cautiously. Lucifer was there smiling sheepishly. "Um, hi. I, well, wanted to apologize."

"Why?" she asked incredulity.

He shifted uncomfortably. "For, you know, the other day."

"Ahh, yes. When you didn't get drunk." She teased. Then her expression turned serous. "Hey, it's fine. We've all been there. It's not a crime to need to talk to someone."

"But still." He sighed. "I just feel bad for dragging you into my mess."

"Like I said, no problem." Liz nodded toward the doorway. "Do you want to come in?"

"No really, I couldn't. You've already done so much." Lucifer protested.

"I can't just leave you just standing out in the hallway." Liz argued. "And I really don't mind."

Lucifer sighed "Alright." He agreed. They went into the apartment.

Selina sat on the kitchen table her body relaxed and her tail moving back and forth, showing her interest in the newcomer.

Lucifer looked at Selina with a curious stare. "You're not Jacks." He told the cat.

The cat snorted. "No shit, Sherlock. Do I look like a gigantic black dog to you? My name is Selina, thanks for asking."

"Whoa." Lucifer held up his hands in surrender. "I just didn't know Liz had a dog  _and_  a cat."

Liz was doing her best not to laugh at this. "It's fine, Selina just enjoys messing with people."

"And it's  _two_  cats actually." Selina told him.

Lucifer looked at Liz in hopes that she could explain what the heck the insane cat was talking about. Liz took pity on him. "Selina has a brother, Leo."

"Ahh, okay." He let out a deep breath.

Liz tilted here head to the side slightly and studied him. "Are you okay?" She asked.

He nodded slightly. "I'm just not used to being sassed at by cats."

Liz smirked at that. "I'd get used to that if I were you. Selina is the most sarcastic cat to have ever sassed."

Lucifer smiled slightly at that. But Selina, however, looked offended. "You do know I can hear you, right?"

Liz smirked. "Yes, cat. That was the  _point_."

Selina growled and put her head on her paws. She looked toward the clock. "Oh, dammit."

"What?" Liz asked.

"I was supposed to meet Leo  _five minutes ago;_ he is so going to kill me." Selina ran towards the open window. "It was nice meeting you; bye!" She said as she jumped out the window.

Lucifer looked uncomfortable again. "Are you sure you're okay?" Liz asked him.

"Yeah, I'm fine." He took a deep breath. "I'm fine, of course I'm fine."

That wasn't fine behavior. But Liz let it go.

"Did you do this?" Lucifer asked behind her.

"Do what?" Liz asked, walking over to him. He was looking at her journal. "Oh, yeah I did that."

Right now there were only five pages in the journal. They were filled with her notes on the vampire wards.

"This is impressive. I've developed wards against angels and demons but I've never even considered wards for the children of Eve." Lucifer said as he sat down at the table.

"Thanks, but it's still in beta phase. The spell decays too quickly for long term use."

Lucifer fingered the page. "What if you add a stabilizing glyph?" Lucifer suggested.

Liz's eyes widened. "How did I not think of that!?"

"You were overcomplicating it."

Liz sat down next to him and scribbled down the hieroglyph down in the journal. "We'd have to run a field test, but I think this will work."

Lucifer wasn't so bad, not when you considered the fact that humans had spent thousands of years playing up his dark side. He had so far been a tolerable person. He had proven to be intelligent, easy to talk to, and neither Selina nor Jacks had tried to kill him so that meant he (almost certainly) wasn't a danger to her (and he was socially awkward which was actually a little adorable). All in all, Liz found the devil to be a likeable person.

Lucifer was looking at the journal again. "How come there are only five pages in the journal?"

"There isn't just five pages." She said with a slight smile.

He raised an eyebrow at her.

"You see the book was a gift from Thoth, and it's enchanted. Only the pages I want to view are out." Liz picked up the book, closed it, and then she traced her fingers across the black-leather cover. She then held the book back out to Lucifer.

***SPN***

Lucifer took it and opened it. There was now at least five times the number of pages there had been. Lucifer flipped through the pages, and he realized that all of them contained notes on different wards and sigils.

"Those are all the sigils and wards I've developed." Liz said.

"These are brilliant." Lucifer commented.

"It's nothing, really."

"No, these really are amazing." Lucifer looked up at her.

"Well, thank you." The corners of her mouth tilted upwards in a slight smile. "Alright, hell boy. Since you've caught me in a good mood I'm going to show you something."

Liz held out her hand and Lucifer gave the journal back to her; and she ran her fingers down the cover again.

She held the journal back out to him. He went to grab it, but Liz pulled the journal back, just out of his reach. "What I'm about to show you, I've never showed  _anyone_."

He nodded solemnly; understanding how huge it was for her to trust him with this. He reached out again and this time she let him take the book. He opened it slowly, unsure of what to expect.

His eyes widened when he saw what it was.

Lucifer was at a loss for words. He didn't know what to say.

It was her sketchbook. There were drawings of different people, objects (Like flowers and cards on a coffee table), and different places (the city skyline, a waterfall, something that looked like an armory); so realistic it looked it looked like someone had glued pictures into the book.

But the most interesting thing was the dragons. These weren't drawings of Eve's mongrels; but of the first dragons, the children of Ra. Most of them had died in the war against Apophis, and the rest had just vanished. No one had seen them for millennia. But these were perfectly drawn.

The drawings were beautiful, exquisite, meticulous; and any other word that could be used to describe beauty.

"Liz, these are astounding." Lucifer said, flipping through the small book. "If you compared a photograph to these drawings there would be no difference."

A slight blush filled her cheeks at the high praise. "It's just a hobby."

"Why have you never shown these to anybody?"

"My parents thought art was a waste of time, so I never showed anyone so my dad wouldn't find out."

"Your dad sounds like a jerk." Lucifer told her. In his opinion, trying to discourage originality and creativity was poor parenting skills.

Liz smirked at that "Yeah, he kind of was."

"Well, I should probably be going." Lucifer stood up.

"Yeah, the demons might start wondering where you are." Liz agreed, than she continued. "You know, most humans consider it bad manners to just show up unannounced at someone's house."

"Oh, sorry." Lucifer mumbled.

"It's fine but people usually meet each other at specific times. That way they don't have to worry about conflicting schedules."

Lucifer nodded, unsure of where Liz was going with this.

"So, would you want to come over again next Saturday?"

Wait, was she asking him to come back? Lucifer tried to keep the look of surprise of his face. She thought of him as a friend! "Yeah I'd like to come over." He said casually.

"Alright good" Liz nodded. "I'll see you on Saturday."

"Yeah, I'll see you on Saturday." Lucifer said. Then he flew back to this week's headquarters in west Georgia.

He paced in his office trying to calm himself down. Liz liked him as a friend. She was the first person in, perhaps his whole life, who wanted to spend time with him because of who he  _was._ Not because of his power or because they were family; but because of who he was.

This was exciting. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The dragon thing has absolutely no basis in mythology whatsoever. It's just something I made up (but it will play a role in the story later). Please bear with me.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Italic represents psychic conversation.

Lucifer had worked himself into a state about meeting Liz. He didn't know if he was supposed to bring anything or… Lucifer had to admit that he was unprepared for this. He didn't know what was expected of him.

He just decided to go as he was. If he made a mistake he would rectify it next time. If there was a next time.

Lucifer appeared in the hallway outside of Liz's apartment. He shifted uncomfortably for a few seconds then; finally, he knocked on her door.

Liz opened it right away. "Oh hey, you're here. Hello."

"Hello. Um, can I come in?" He asked.

"Yeah, of course."

They went into the apartment and there was a black cat sitting on the table.

"Is this him?" The cat asked. He wasn't Selina.

"You must be Leo." Lucifer said. "Hello."

"Hi." Then Leo looked at Liz. "Have you asked him?"

"No, not yet." Liz admitted.

"Wait, hold on. Ask me what?" Lucifer questioned.

Liz sighed. "You know that I don't have the cleanest track record, right?"

"Yeah, I know you're a thief."

"Oh, good. I can skip the awkward explanation." Liz paused. "We need your help to break into a bank."

Of all the ways Lucifer had thought the day might go, this was not something he had prepared for. "I'm sorry, what?"

"I think someone at the bank is stealing from accounts, but I need certain information to prove it." She brushed a strand of her hair back behind her ear. "If you don't want to do it I understand."

"No, it's fine." Lucifer smirked. "Let's go rob a bank."

"You don't have a lot to do. You're going to be the distraction." Liz told him, and then she frowned. "The hardest part will be trying to signal you in a way that won't be blindingly obvious."

"I have a solution." Lucifer said as he stepped up close to Liz and pressed their foreheads together. He felt the connection spring up and then he stepped back.

"What the fuck was that!" She exclaimed.

Lucifer answered using the psychic connection he had just set up. " _It's a mental link, this way you won't need a 'blindingly obvious' signal to contact me._ "

" _This is weird, but you're right it is easier._ " Then aloud she said. "Well that solves  _that_ problem."

Leo stood up. "Excellent." He said. "Now, here's the plan…"

***SPN***

Liz was excited. It had been a while since she had broken into someplace and stolen something (even if this was for a righteous cause).

This was also a test for Lucifer. Liz was a thief, and sometimes she did it for not-so-righteous reasons. This friendship wouldn't work if Lucifer didn't approve of her "hobby". Liz didn't really expect him to have a problem, he was the freaking devil after all, but there was a (really small) chance that the fallen angel had better morals than her.

Liz, Lucifer, and Leo stood in front of the bank, mentally preparing themselves.

"Ready?" Liz asked them.

"Yup." Lucifer nodded. "See you on the other side." Lucifer entered the bank, pulling several papers out of his pocket.

Liz and Leo waited a few seconds and then they went inside too. They walked over to the bench on one side of the room and Liz pulled out her phone and pretended to look at something, and Leo hid under the bench.

Lucifer went up to one of the tellers. Even though she couldn't hear him Liz knew he was asking for the bank manager, Anne Caldwin.

About a minute later Caldwin came down to speak to Lucifer. When she approached him he asked in a loud voice. "Are you Anne Caldwin?"

Liz could see Caldwin nod her head in confirmation. Without saying anything else Lucifer unfolded the papers he was carrying and started to read them in the same loud voice. Even from her vantage point across the room, there was no mistaking the look of horror on Anne Caldwin's face when she realized that the man in front of her was bringing a lawsuit against the bank. Caldwin began asking him if they could take this to her office; but Lucifer continued on undaunted and in the same loud voice. And now everyone was beginning to stare.

Liz stood up and slipped past the distracted people and slipped into the hallway leading to Caldwin's office with Leo right on her heels.

When they got to the door, Liz examined the lock. When she saw what it was she almost laughed; the lock was the same type you'd expect to find on the door to an elementary teacher's classroom. Even novices should be able to pick the lock. She might as well have put up a sign saying 'please break into my office.'

Liz quickly picked the lock and stepped into the office. Leo sat down right outside the door. "I give you five minutes before someone comes this way." Leo warned.

"I'll be quick." Liz assured him.

Liz quickly plugged her flash drive into the computer sitting on the desk and began downloading the data from the computer's hard drive.

It took about four minutes for the drive to download everything. When it was done Liz took the drive out, relocked the door, and gave Leo the drive (Leo would take it back to the apartment so just in case Liz was frisked she wouldn't have the drive on her).

Liz walked down the hallway and joined the crowd watching Lucifer and Caldwin. Caldwin was now  _begging_  Lucifer to go to her office so they could continue this in private. She looked like she was going to cry.

" _Alright, hell boy that's enough._ " Liz thought.

Lucifer stopped reading and gave Caldwin a curt nod. "I'll see you in court." Then he walked outside. After a few seconds Liz followed.

Lucifer was waiting outside. "Did you get it?"

"I sent Leo back to the apartment with it." Liz confirmed.

Lucifernodded. "I guess you'll want to go over the data now."

"Later." Liz told him. "Right now I'm out with a friend."

Lucifer gave her a look that was somehow a mixture between grateful and hopeful. Liz smiled at him. "There's this place a few blocks from here. They make the best burgers in the city; and their fries are delicious too. Do you want to go?"

"Yeah, I'd like that." He said.

"Come on, let's go."

***SPN***

Lucifer was feeling great. The burgers and fries were  _really_  good. He almost wanted to order another one, but he felt that might be rude. He had this strange feeling in his gut; and Lucifer realized with a jolt that it was happiness. He was actually happy.

Liz was telling him a story from her childhood. "So one day my brother Ross and I wanted to go out for dinner. So, because we were special children we decided to con our way to The Ritz-Carlton. We managed to convince the concierge that we were some billionaire's kids. So they took us up to the pent house, right? And then we ordered room service. Did you know they have $1,000 hamburgers there?"

"No, really?" The hamburgers at this place were only eight dollars; he couldn't imagine how someone could charge a thousand dollars for a burger that probably wouldn't taste as good.

"Yeah, and we ordered five. Five freaking thousand dollar hamburgers. And then for dessert we ordered a fifty dollar cheese cake." She said smiling at the memory. "I'd have loved to see the man's face when he had to pay a $5,050 dollar charge on things he didn't order."

"It sounds like you were quite the trouble maker as a kid." Lucifer commented.

"Oh, that's not even the tip of the iceberg." She snorted. "Okay, hell boy your turn."

"What?" he asked confused.

"Oh, come on. You've got to have some funny story from your childhood."

Lucifer began. "Okay, so when I was a fledgling…"

"Fledgling?" Liz asked.

"It means a young angel. Now do you want to hear the story or not?"

"I do, sorry. Go on."

Lucifer started again. "When I was a fledgling, I started flying late. Compered to Gabriel and Raphael I was really a late bloomer. But before they were created it was just me and Michael; and Michael tried his hardest to get me to fly, but I just couldn't. Then one day my uncle Ra came to visit. I told him about my flying problems and do you know what he did?"

"What?" Liz asked, leaning forward.

"He grabbed my shoulder and he flew us to the top of this cliff, and then without any warning  **he pushed me off the cliff**."

Liz laughed. "Seriously?"

Lucifer nodded "Seriously."

"So what happens next?" Liz asked.

"Hmm? Oh, I managed to spread my wings out a glide. Then I flapped my wings and rose a few feet. I was flying. In my euphoria, I flew around for what must have been fifteen minutes. Afterwards I flew back up the cliff. When I get back up there Ra slaps me on the back and tells me that I've done well.

Liz smirks. "What?" he asks her.

"It just sounds like something a friend of mine would do." Liz told him.

"I was pretty pissed at Ra afterwards." Lucifer said.

"Well, it sounds like Ra believed that you could do it, and didn't want to wait for you to catch up in that belief."

Lucifer is about to respond when he gets a prayer from one of his demons. They've screwed something up  _again_. "I've got to go. There's an emergency. I'm sorry." He says.

"It's fine." She says. "So same time next week?"

A small smile spread across Lucifer's features. She was inviting him back! "Yeah, I'll see you then."

"Alright, see you then." Liz smiles.

Lucifer flies off to deal with the demons. He hates them; how much longer until he can exterminate them?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So we you got some childhood stories. And oh look there's Ra again *cough cough*.
> 
> I sat in front of my computer for about an hour before I decided that Liz was the kind of person that would rather rob a bank on the first date than go to a movie (even though they're still just friends).


	10. Chapter 10

Every Saturday Lucifer would go to Liz's house and they would do something different. She took him to the movies and to different restaurants. Afterwards Liz would ask him if he liked it, like such an unimportant thing mattered. But it did to her.

She leant him some of her books to read. Some were books that movies were based on, others weren't. Lucifer found he liked reading. He read everything from  _Harry Potter_ to The _Art of War_. If the demons ever noticed his strange new pastime they never mentioned it.

The millions of people in New York still bothered him. It was claustrophobic. But whenever he started to freak out Liz would just lightly grab his wrist, and just like that they were the only people in the street.

She introduced him to some of the 'mythical' creatures in the city. He realized that these people weren't all that bad. He actually liked Liz's godson, Lionel MacArthur (who, for some reason, didn't seem to mind at all that he was the Devil) and his uncle wasn't so bad either. Some of the pagans managed to rub him the wrong way, but a lot of them were tolerable.

His introduction to music was accidental. He walked in on Liz playing a guitar. She had actually been a little embarrassed. He found out that, like her drawings, no one else knew she could play. But after playing a song for him and realizing that she had neglected to introduce him to music, she lent him her iPod. He spent hours just listening to her playlists. He found he liked rock, hated country, and liked some of the alternative bands she listened to (but not all of them). She was also really good at both playing the guitar and singing; but whenever he tried to compliment her she would blush and wave it off.

Liz got him a cellphone. They would text at all hours of the day. About what books he was reading, or what she had done that day (because there was rarely ever a quiet day in New York). Sometimes one would call the other and they would talk for hours about nothing really. Her voice was calming, especially after a stressful day.

Sometimes he would help her with designing new wards and spells. She taught him how to pick locks, and crack safes. It was their version of evening Sudoku.

She taught him chess and he always lost, but it was taking longer for him to loose, so he supposed that meant he was making progress. He was terrible at poker though;  _Jacks_  beat him at poker (according to Liz, that's how the dog got his name). You know you're terrible when the dog can beat you.

She taught him about history and modern day politics. He found Liz knew every little detail. Her memory was impeccable.

Liz took him to the Metropolitan Museum of Art where she worked. He knew next to nothing about art, but Liz seemed to have memorized every little detail. With her, a picture really was worth a thousand words. He asked her if she had ever stolen anything from this museum. She had laughed at that, even though he never meant it has a joke. But he found he liked her laugh, and the smile she gave him after.

All the while, something strange was happening. When they touched, he felt a tingling sensation on his skin. Sometimes he found his thoughts drifting toward her at seemingly random moments. Then while they were marathoning  _Lord of the Rings_  she fell asleep on his shoulder, and he finally understood the expression of 'butterflies in your stomach.'

He started quoting the movies and books that he'd seen in normal conversation. Whenever he did this she would immediately respond with another quote. And then she would smile, and the butterflies would be back.

Then one day they were sparring in the basement of her apartment building. Sparring was basically all out fighting with a partner to keep your skills sharp. Lucifer had gone easy on Liz at first; but then she threw him so hard into a wall that the plaster broke.

It turned out that they were pretty much evenly matched. But then Liz tried several hard lunges. Some of them broke through his guard and manages to leave cuts and bruises. The last strike left her off balance and Lucifer took the advantage and he managed to disarm her and pin her against a wall. He pressed into her to stop her from breaking out of the hold. Then time seemed to slow down; and he suddenly became aware that they were pressed  _tightly_  against each other. Their faces were only a few inches apart, and Lucifer was suddenly seized by the urge to kiss her. His head dipped down slightly…

Lucifer stopped himself. What was he doing? He took a few steps back and let her off the wall.

" _Nice move_." Liz commented. When they were the only ones speaking they spoke telepathically, it was easier.

" _Thanks_." They were both breathing heavily; it had been a vigorous session. It had been a while since he had fought anyone with skills that challenged his own. He guessed it was the same for Liz.

" _All right, hell boy. I need a break_." Liz said. She sat down, leaning against the wall. Lucifer sat down next to her, his mind still racing over what had just happened. He had almost  _kissed_  her.

She was a  _human._  Most humans tried their hardest to leave a mark on the world so that people would remember them; they tried to fit into certain molds so other people would like them. They didn't understand that sometimes the world would have been better off without their mark; and that they may have done better if they acted outside of society's norms.

But Liz wasn't like that. Liz didn't care if people would remember her after her death, or if people liked her. If you liked her, great. If you didn't, you should go tell someone who cared because she certainly didn't. She was her own person. Liz was smarter than you without ever being a show-off or know-it-all. She always told you her honest opinion, even if you didn't want to hear it (the spatula incident attested to that, Lucifer had been originally pissed before realizing that she was probably right). She just did things to help people and never expected anything in return. There were an infinite number of things that made Liz different.

But it couldn't happen. Soon all humans would either be dead or infected with the Croatoan virus. He couldn't save Liz even if he wanted to; she would be miserable.

" _You know, your fighting style is very similar to how Ross' was._ " Liz said suddenly, shaking him out of his thoughts.

" _Really?_ "

" _Yeah, you both are fucking brutal. I think you almost broke my arm_."

" _Sorry_."

" _Don't be, it's been a while since I sparred with a good partner_." The corner of Liz's mouth twitched upwards into a smile.

" _Yeah, same here._ " He smiled back.

They sat in a comfortable silence for a while. But the mention of Ross had brought up a question that had been nagging him for a while.

" _Liz, what happened to Ross and your dad?_ " Lucifer asked. As soon as the words left his mouth he felt Liz stiffen beside him.

***SPN***

The question took Liz completely by surprise

" _I suppose you have a right to know, I mean everyone does_." Liz sighed. " _Everything started when John and Dean Winchester visited New York…_ "

" _Whoa, hold on. You know the Winchesters?_ " Lucifer asked.

" _Well I know Dean. I've only met Sam once for a few minutes and he was nine at the time._ "

" _Are you in contact with them?_ "

" _No, I haven't spoken to Dean in years. But I know about the whole vessel thing. And by the way, speaking as someone who is a vessel themselves, it's so very not cool_." Liz shook her head. " _Can I get back to the story now?_ "

Without waiting for his reply, she continued. " _So John and Dean were in town. At the same time chaos energy levels started spiking in the city. Then a few days later Dean went out to get coffee and didn't come back. None of us were really worried; we all thought he was out with a girl. But after a few hours John traced Dean's cellphone. He found it in a trash can near our apartment building._

_So then we raised the alarm. Everybody was looking for him. For two days we found nothing. And then Morgan told us she had definite proof that Dean was in an abandoned warehouse at the docks. We accepted it without question._

_So we were at the docks; Morgan, Ross, John, my parents, and me. We had to split up to search the factory. I found Dean without incident. As I was untying him we heard this really loud explosion and suddenly I got really cold. We went toward the direction of the explosion and through a window we saw my parents lying too still, on the ground. And Morgan stabbing Ross. I wanted to charge in there and fight her but Dean stopped me. He dragged me away and made me see sense. I would have died there if it hadn't been for him._

_We found John and then, even though John didn't want me to, I called 911. Ross and my dad were dead when they got there and my mother was moved to the I.C.U._ "

Liz realized that she was crying. She hastily wiped the tears, hoping Lucifer wouldn't notice. No such luck. But he didn't comment; he only wrapped his arms around her. She leaned back against him.

" _Is it possible she could have been possessed?_ " Lucifer asked

" _No, I get this chill around chaos demons. I would have known._ "

" _I'm sorry._ "

" _It's not your fault._ " Liz shook her head. " _Sometimes_   _I still feel like I'm still wrapping my head around the idea of Morgan,_ _ **Morgan**_ _of all people, selling us out and joining the chaos demons._

_But anyway, after my mom got out of the hospital she said she was going to take some time away from New York. She went to California and told me she would call after she settled in. She never called. She's fine; I guess she just doesn't want anything to do with me._ "

There was silence for a while. The Lucifer spoke up. " _When my father first created the humans, he started spending a large portion of time away from home. I was alarmed by this; I thought that it would be disastrous toward the host. I also, admittedly, thought you humans were unworthy of my father's attentions._ "

" _Wow, Luci, don't sugar coat it._ "Liz joked.

" _Sorry, that was what I thought. Anyway I went to Michael with my concerns, and he beat on me. He said that I was a freak for doubting our father and that I was unworthy of the trust he put in me."_

Liz noticed that his hands were shaking. " _Luci, you don't have to tell me this._ " She said, gently grabbing his hands.

" _Yes I do._ " There was a determined look in his eyes. " _So after he was done 'teaching me my place' he stabbed me in my left wing. Then he brought me to Earth and left me there. I couldn't fly home because of my wing. I think it was supposed to teach me compassion for humans, being stuck on Earth. All it did was make my resentment towards them grow._

_I was kind of pissed at Michael and my father. To spite them and show them how easy it was to corrupt humans; I grabbed a young girl and turned her into a demon. Everything just snowballed from there."_

Liz didn't know what to say. There was a lot she should be saying but she couldn't figure out how to express how she felt. How exactly did you express simultaneous forgiveness and understanding?You couldn't. And if you could, Liz couldn't find the words.

They just sat there; with his arms wrapped around her, in a comfortable silence.

" _You must be crazy to put up with me._ " Lucifer told her.

" _You know, I could say the same thing._ " She said with a small smile.

Maybe she was crazy. She had realized a few months ago that she liked Lucifer as more than a friend. When she thought Lucifer was going to kiss her she actually hadn't minded. But it was probably wishful thinking; he was the devil. He wanted to destroy humanity. But that didn't stop her from liking him.

Liz had actually been happier these past few months. She had started rebuilding relationships with the people she had pushed away after Morgan's betrayal; she met Gilgamesh for coffee once a week and she got drinks with Athena and Sif every so often. Her nightmares had almost stopped. She could actually get a restful night's sleep. And she actually had fun when they went out. Sometimes she went home at night with her sides hurting from laughing so hard. Looking back, she could hardly believe that only a few months ago she could barely convince herself to get up in the morning.

Lucifer suddenly stiffened. " _I've got to go_."

" _What's happening now?_ "

" _Another one of the horsemen was defeated. I have to go find out_ …"

" _Okay, bye_." But he was already gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We finally find out what happened to the Holloways. I place that event as happening a few weeks before John disappears and Dean goes to see Sam at Stanford. And speaking of that; you were mistaken if you thought I was going to leave the Winchesters out of this! Liz and Dean actually go way back; but you'll find out more about that later.
> 
> There was also a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment where Liz revealed information that will be important later in the story. Did you catch it?


	11. Chapter 11

Lucifer arrived in front of Liz's door feeling exhausted. It had been a busy week; and as he could count the number of competent demons on one hand, a majority of the work fell on him. He couldn't wait to spend the day relaxing with Liz.

He knocked on the door and Liz opened it. "I'm really, really sorry about this." She said when she saw him.

Well that was ominous. But before Lucifer could question it, he found himself being dragged into the apartment by a visibly nervous Liz. The fact that Liz was nervous made him nervous because Liz could look vengeful pagans in the eyes and insult them and be completely cool; so whatever this was about had to be bad.

She half-dragged him into the kitchen. There was a man he had never met before leaning against the counter.

This man unnerved him. There was something about him that made his hair stand on end. And he seemed  _familiar_. Lucifer felt like he should know this man, which was strange because he could count on one hand the number of humans that he found important enough recognize and this man wasn't one of them.

The man looked him up and down with storm gray eyes; then he scowled and turned to Liz. "Your mystery friend is the Devil?"

"Yep." Liz said.

The man spread his arms in a 'why' gesture and Liz shrugged in return. The man sighed. "Lizzy, we are going to have a talk about this later." Then he fixed his gaze on Lucifer. "But right now we need your help."

"Help with what?" Lucifer didn't know if he really wanted an answer.

"To rob the Met." Liz said target was the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where Liz worked. It was going to be a tough target; the warding in the museum prevented you from teleporting into the place.

Lucifer gave her a wry smile. "I'm not even surprised, at this point it's just another day." Then psychically he asked. " _Liz who is this guy_?"

" _This is Gilgamesh._ "She responded.

Oh shit. Gilgamesh was basically Liz's second father. And she liked him better than her dad. And if Gilgamesh disapproved of him… the thought made him panic. If Gilgamesh disapproved of him, which he undoubtedly did, he would tell Liz to stop hanging out with him. Liz would listen to Gilgamesh.

Lucifer made himself calm down. He told himself that he'd cross that bridge if he got to it.

"So, what's the job?" Lucifer asked aloud.

"So a few months ago this mob boss from L.A. comes forward with a painting that he claims is a lost work of Vincent van Gogh." Liz says. "The only problem is that van Gogh never made that painting."

"I knew Vincent." Gilgamesh said. "I know every picture he ever painted and that isn't one of them. Trying to pass off this forgery is an insult to his memory."

Lucifer frowned. "But if it's a forgery, shouldn't people realize it when they're authenticating the painting."

"Oh, they have. I was part of the team that authenticated it. I was threatened by said mob boss; and he told me that if I didn't say that the painting was real, he would kill people who were important to me." Liz said evenly, like she was stating a simple fact.

Gilgamesh huffed angrily, and Lucifer felt the same way. But he knew Liz wouldn't appreciate it if he mother-henned her about it. So instead he focused on the job. "What do we need to do?"

Gilgamesh unrolled blue prints. "The museum hasn't actually bought the painting yet. But the purchase is tomorrow, so tonight's our chance. The painting is being held in the restoration room,  _here_." He circled the room. "Now tonight the museum is hosting a charity gala, over  _here_." He circled the room where the gala would be.

Liz stepped in. "All the museum staff have been given an invite and are allowed to take a plus one, which is good because this is a two man job."

"Wait; if this is a two man job, why do you need my help?" Lucifer asked.

"Gilgamesh has been banned from the museum." Liz said with a smirk. And this was without a doubt the man who really raised Liz. To do something so out there that you got banned from a place in  _New York City_ was exactly something that Liz would do.

"Alright, alright. Stay focused." Gilgamesh grumbled. Gilgamesh filled in the rest of the details about the plan. "So are we clear?" Gilgamesh asked when he was finished.

Liz and Lucifer nodded in agreement.

"Liz requested I pick up something for tonight." Gilgamesh said. "I'll be back soon." He gave Lucifer an indecipherable look before heading out.

" _What are we going to do_?" Lucifer asked Liz.

Liz gave him a look. " _You know, you're going to be expected to dance at this._ "

" _Liz, I don't know how to dance._ "

" _I know, so I'm going to have to teach you_." Liz offered him her hand. He took it and Liz pulled him close. She guided his hands so one rested on her shoulder and the other held her hand. " _Just step where I step_."

Then they were moving. Forward left, slide right, turn, forward right, slide left, turn, and repeat. At first Lucifer was clumsy and stumbling. But eventually he worked out a rhythm. Liz got her iPod out so he could learn to move to the beat of the music. Once Liz was confident he had mastered it, they moved onto other dances. In a few hours he was reasonably confident he could get through the evening without making a fool of himself.

They had gotten the necessary dances out of the way and now they were slow dancing. They were positioned with his hands around her waist, and her arms around his shoulders. Liz had told him it would be unlikely that they would have the chance to use this one, and he had mastered it in thirty seconds. But they didn't have anything else to do anyway, and he liked being this close to Liz.

" _You know I've always loved dancing._ " Liz told him.

" _Really_?"

" _Yeah; I haven't done it in a while, though. I haven't had a partner._ "

He was about to respond when Gilgamesh entered the apartment, carrying a garment bag. He stepped away from Liz when Gilgamesh glared at him.

"Here, I have something for you." Gilgamesh threw the garment bag at Lucifer. There was an expensive-looking suit inside. "You can't go to the gala dressed like that."

Lucifer looked down at the clothes he was currently wearing. He saw Gilgamesh's point. He took the bag. "Thank you for picking this up."

"You're welcome." Gilgamesh responded. An awkward pause stretched after that statement.

"Okay!" Liz clapped her hands together. "Lucifer you can use the bathroom to change. And if you'll excuse me I have to go get ready myself."

Lucifer hurried into the bathroom and changed quickly. He finished changing in three minutes, and spent the next ten trying to tie his tie. He eventually managed it and he made a mental note to find out who invented ties and drag them to the deepest level of hell.

He walked back into the living room and to his dismay Liz wasn't there yet. He resolved to try and be polite.

He sat on the couch across from Gilgamesh. There was a minute where nothing was said and Gilgamesh's eyes focused intensely on him. It was really uncomfortable.

Then suddenly Gilgamesh asked, "What are your intentions toward Liz?"

The question caught him off guard. "We're just friends."

"But seriously, what are you doing here? You brought the apocalypse. You want to destroy humanity, and Liz is human." Was he imagining it, or did he see disappointment in Gilgamesh's eyes when he mentioned the apocalypse?

Lucifer shrugged. "I like her."

"Why?" he demanded.

"Because she's the first person in my entire existence to like me; not because of  _what_  I am, but because of  _who_  I am. She sees me, the real me, and she's not appalled; she isn't afraid." The truth came spilling from his lips before he could stop it.

Gilgamesh nodded. "If you hurt her I will make you regret it."

"That is the one thing you don't have to worry about." Lucifer said seriously.

There was a very uncomfortable silence after that. And then after several eternities Liz came out.

The only makeup she was wearing was a small amount of eyeliner that made her blue eyes standout. She was wearing a black long-sleeved low cut dress that came down to just above her knees.

She was, in a word, breathtaking.

Lucifer stood up. He searched for words but she had rendered him speechless. Finally he managed, " _You look beautiful_."

" _Really_?"

" _No, beautiful barely covers just how amazing you look._ " She beamed at his comment.

" _You don't look so bad yourself_." She teased. Then she asked, " _Do you think I look better like this_?"

Lucifer shook his head. " _I like you best when you're being you. There's no denying you look stunning like this, but it's something you wouldn't be caught dead in regularly. And you look just as beautiful everyday as you do right now._ " And that was truth, although he didn't realize it until he said it. How could he not have seen this before? He realized that he had seen it, but had subconsciously shoved those thoughts aside.

Liz smiled at him. " _Honey, you'll turn a girl's head with talk like that_."

Wait, hold on. Was she flirting with him? Should he be flirting back?

Thankfully Gilgamesh interrupted before he could make a fool of himself. "Are you guys having a physic conversation?" Gilgamesh asked.

Liz said "No." at the exact time Lucifer said "Yes."

"Rude." But he smirked like Liz did when she didn't really mind.

"Alright, we should go if we want to make it on time." Liz said.

"Whoa, wait." Gilgamesh grabbed a camera off the counter. "Prom pictures."

Liz rolled her eyes. But she moved next to Lucifer and smiled. Gilgamesh took a picture. "There, happy?" She asked.

"Immensely." He responded. "Now go, have fun!"

"Goodbye." Liz called as they walked out the door.

They walked for a minute before Liz spoke up. " _Are you okay_? _You look like something is bothering you._ "

" _Yeah, it's just… I don't think Gilgamesh approves of me._ "

" _Gilgamesh doesn't approve of most of the things I do. He also didn't approve when I got my Harley Softail. It didn't stop me._ "

That made him smile. That bike was Liz's pride and joy. He still was unsure though. Liz must have noticed. " _Did you really think I would just stop letting you come over just if Gilgamesh said so; because if you did then you and I have not met. Come on hell boy, you're my best friend! I'm not concerned with what everyone else says._ "

Lucifer would never admit it to anyone, but he started to tear up. " _You'll never know how much that means to me._ "

" _Trust me, I do_." They walked in silence for the rest of the way, but it was a comfortable silence.

The Museum looked beautiful at night. As they walked up the steps Lucifer took a moment to appreciate the way it was lit up. It wasn't until they got inside that the problem started. He still had a bit of a problem with other people. And when they got inside it was really crowed. He tried to keep it together, he really did. But after the tenth person bumped into him, irrational panic started building. It was always worse when he was indoors.

Onetime when Lucifer was sitting alone in his office he considered it and figured that his time in the cage had left him with some form of claustrophobia. But he was not currently alone in his office and he was on the verge of freaking out.

Thankfully Liz seemed to realize it and crooked her elbow into his. He started calming down. Of course the people were still around, he still felt like he didn't have enough room, and he was still a little uncomfortable. But her touch was enough to reassure him that he wasn't alone in this teeming mass, and that was enough.

After a few minutes a man walked onto a makeshift stage. He started saying things into a microphone and Lucifer supposed that the man was making a speech; but everyone was talking and the microphone only distorted the sound so Lucifer couldn't understand a word of what was being said. The the speech ended and everyone clapped.

Then the music started.

Lucifer led them over to the dance floor and they started to dance. Liz's movements were smooth and graceful and he didn't do as bad as he thought he'd do. After a few songs Liz gave him the signal and he maneuvered them over to where the curator of the museum was dancing with his date. Lucifer spun her around and as she turned she quickly grabbed his ID card from the clip on his belt and she slipped it into Lucifer's pocket. The curators' card was the only one that could open up the restoration room after hours. As soon as the song ended they made their way to the side of the room and slipped out of it.

The cameras were on a loop (Liz had done that yesterday) so they didn't have to worry about that. But there was a patrol that came through this area every five minutes, and it took eight to get to the restoration room. They would get to the supply closet about halfway down the hall, and wait until the guard passed. In theory it was a good plan. However, the guard was slightly early. As Lucifer was closing the door the guard rounded the corner.

" _Liz_."

" _Yeah_?"

" _The guard saw me_."

" _Shit_! _He's early_."

" _I know_.  _What do we do_?"

Liz thought about it. Her eyes darted around the small closet for something that could be of use. Finally they focused on him. " _Kiss me_."

" _What_?!" Did she just say what he thought she said?

" _If the guard sees us kissing, he'll assume that we just snuck away for some privacy and_..." The doorknob began to turn. " _Oh, for god's sake_!" She grabbed his tie, pulled his head down, and pressed their lips together in a chaste kiss.

In the back of his mind Lucifer registered that the door was opened and then shut quickly, but that wasn't important because Elizabeth Holloway was  _kissing_  him; and he froze.

She pulled away quickly after the guard shut the door. " _I'm sorry about that_."

Before she got too far he pulled her back. And then a part of him was screaming to stop, to walk away, because he was  _kissing_  Elizabeth Holloway. And she was kissing  _back_. And he didn't stop, because even though he was the devil, he was a hypocrite and he  _wanted_  this. And her tongue was sweeping across the top of his mouth, and right now there was no place he'd rather be.

Eventually Liz had to come up for air. " _I take that back, I'm not sorry at all. Are you_?"

" _No, not at all_." He replied honestly. And suddenly he felt a rush of emotions that weren't his, and Lucifer remembered  _why_  it had been a bad idea to kiss her.

" _Later, after we steal the painting, we are going to talk about this._ " She promised. " _But we have to go, now._ " She probably wouldn't like what he was going to say. Lucifer didn't know how she was going to react when she learned of the bond. But right now he had to but his brave face on.

" _Okay. Let's go_."

They made it to the restoration room without incident. Lucifer scanned the card and they got in easy. But the safe was the hard part. The safe could only be opened if someone entered the combination and turned they safe's key within three seconds of each other.

" _When I say now, turn the key_." Liz instructed.

She put her ear to the safe and began turning the handle. After about five minutes and three attempts (judging by Liz's cursing) she gave the signal. " _Now_!"

The safe creaked open, revealing the painting inside. It was smaller than he expected. Lucifer pulled it out of the safe.

They got to the back entrance and slipped out the door without incident. But they didn't say anything. The easy banter that normally passed between them had ceased, and Lucifer found the silence deafening. And the worst part was that he didn't know how to break it. He grabbed Liz's arm and flew them back to her apartment, all the while trying to figure out how to say what he wanted to say.

But Gilgamesh was there; and this wasn't a conversation Lucifer wanted to have in front of him.

"Oh good, you've got the painting." Gilgamesh said mildly. "Were there any complications?"

Liz shook her head. "No, everything went according to plan." She glanced at Lucifer as she said this.

"Alright, thank you Lucifer, for your help with this." Gilgamesh said. "But I really need to talk with Liz, in private."

Lucifer felt frustrated. He needed to talk with Liz  _now_.

"Hell boy, it's fine. We'll talk next week." Her tone was casual, but her eyes made the statement a promise. As in 'I promise, we will talk about this; but not right now.'

"Okay, I'll see you next week." Lucifer would never know how he managed to keep his voice even. "Good bye."

"Good bye." Liz called back.

Lucifer flew back to this week's headquarters as quickly as possible. Then he leaned against a wall and tried not to freak out.

***SPN***

As soon as Lucifer vanished, Gilgamesh rounded on Liz. "Can I ask why the  _hell_  would you even let the devil into New York? He's trying to end the world Liz! He's defiantly got ulterior motives for being here."

"He's met Jack, Selena, and Leo multiple times and none of them have tried to kill him! What's more, they actually like him!" Liz protested.

"They didn't try to kill Morgan, and look what she's done! They aren't infallible, Liz."

"They acted skittish around her."

"What?"

"The entire month before Morgan's betrayal, they were uneasy around her; and they haven't been acting strangely in any way around him."

That seemed to throw him for a loop. "He's still dangerous."

Liz actually laughed at that. "I'm dangerous! I've taken down entire armies on my own! You're dangerous; I've seen pagans balk at a mere  _look_  from you. Sif and Athena are dangerous too. Should I stay away from them? Should I stay away from you?"

"You know that's not what I mean." He huffed.

"I don't actually. What do you mean?"

"Goddammit! He's trying to bring hell on Earth!" Gilgamesh suddenly stopped; he looked at Liz and smirked. "Oh I know what this is. You think you can help him. You think you can change him so he'll stop the apocalypse. You always saw the best in people even when it wasn't there."

"That's what it was at first." Liz admitted. "I thought that maybe I could show him that humans aren't so bad. But do you know what? He makes me laugh, he helps me design wards, and I can talk to him about everything and nothing. He made me realize that this is a life worth living, something that I had a hard time with after Morgan's betrayal. And you know what? I like him. I genuinely do. And I don't care if you disapprove."

There was silence for a full thirty seconds following her outburst."So that's how it is?" Gilgamesh asked.

Liz nodded, determined. "Yeah, that's how it is."

Gilgamesh left the apartment without another word.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And those idiots finally kiss! Of course this has created a problem. I'm sure you're all wondering what this bond is that Lucifer was so worried about. Three words: angelic mating rituals. But I'll expand on that more next week.
> 
> And look at all this drama. I think Gilgamesh is being kind of reasonable though. I mean, how would you feel if your surrogate daughter befriended the devil and then started getting really close to him? I imagine you wouldn't take it well either.
> 
> Anyway that's all for now. And remember reviews are always welcome!


	12. Chapter 12

Lucifer was aware that Liz had told him that they would meet next week. But he felt he would probably explode if he waited that long. And besides he didn't feel right, Liz didn't know about the bond and it was wrong of him not to tell her right away.

But he was afraid to tell her, because he was afraid of how she would react. He paced his office for a few minutes before deciding that he needed to go.

Lucifer appeared in front of her door. He reached out to knock, but hesitated. Lucifer realized ruefully that this was just like the second time that they spoke. Looking back on it, even then he had known that Elizabeth Holloway was something special. Even if he had refused to acknowledge those thoughts, that was what had kept him coming back.

Determined now, Lucifer knocked on the door. It opened almost immediately. Liz froze when she saw him.

"Hey, can I come in?" He asked.

"Yeah, come on in." She stepped away from the door and he followed her into the apartment.

They sat down next to each other on the couch. Lucifer didn't know where he should start.

" _So, I guess you want to talk about the kiss_." Liz said.

" _About that… Liz, there's something I need to tell you_." Lucifer shifted nervously in his seat.

Liz looked down at the floor, away from him and conflicting emotions crossed her face. He got a sense of bitterness and then resignation. "W _hat_?"

" _How much do you know about angelic mating rituals_?" He blurted.

Liz slowly looked up at him with an expression of bewilderment. " _I don't know anything about angelic mating rituals. Why do you ask_?"

" _This explanation is going to be long, but please bear with me. Okay, so we angels refer to each other as siblings. But we aren't, not really. We are siblings because we fight for and would die for each other, but we are not related through blood. But every once in a while two angels from a connection stronger than the usual angels have with each other. If that happens the angels mate._

 _But before angels can mate they have to be bonded. To trigger the bond, an intimate act has to take place between two angels with an unusually strong emotional connection_."

" _The kiss_." Liz put the pieces together immediately. " _Wait, you_ …"

" _I what_?" Lucifer asked, unsure where she was going.

" _Nothing, never mind_." But she was smiling warmly at him again. And for some reason, the sight of that smile and the knowledge that it was for him (even though he didn't know what he did to cause it) relaxed him and took away some of his nervous tension. " _So tell me more about this bond._ "

" _It's a connection between my grace and your soul. If we're close to each other I should be able to sense your strong emotions and vice versa. Also the telepathy works over larger distances._ "

Liz nodded slowly, digesting the information.

" _I'm sorry; I didn't realize a bond could be formed between humans and angels._ "

" _Why are you sorry_?  _A strong emotional connection goes both ways._ " Wait was she saying what he thought she was saying? " _You told me then that you didn't regret the kiss, did that change_?"

" _No_." He answered immediately.

" _Good, because I don't regret it either_." Liz moved closer to him and put her hand on his thigh.

Lucifer smiled at her. " _What did I ever do to deserve you_?"

" _Well you did start the apocalypse_ …"

He rolled his eyes. " _I meant that in a good way, Liz_."

" _Oh, then I haven't got a clue._ " She teased.

" _Gee thanks_." He grumbled, but he wasn't actually mad.

***SPN***

Liz smiled at him, knowing that he wasn't truly mad.

She could barely believe what had happened to her life, and she meant that in the best possible way.

This bond thing was unexpected. It had taken a minute to process, but it wasn't really a bad thing. The increased radius on their psychic walkie-talkie opened all sorts of new opportunities (okay, occasionally their night out led to robbery; but they only stole things to help the F.B.I. or law enforcement. Well, most of the time) and being able to read some of his emotions would be helpful. Occasionally he would draw back inside himself and shut her out. The bond might help her understand why he did that, and make her able to help him work through whatever it was.

Liz edged her hand toward his slowly, until the tips of her fingers brushed against his hand. He unfurled his fingers and let her hand slip around his.

" _I do have one question though_." Liz told him.

" _Okay, what_?"

" _This bond thing_ … _it's basically the angelic equivalent of dating, right_?"

" _Yeah, I mean if that's okay with you_."

Liz leaned forward and pressed her mouth against his. Unlike their last kiss, it wasn't fast and needy. It was slow and lingering, yet it was still as passionate as their first kiss. His hand tightened slightly around hers and it was like he was hanging on to her, as if he was afraid that she would disappear. But she wasn't going anywhere.

After several long moments, Liz broke the kiss and leaned her forehead against his. " _It's okay with me_."

" _Good, that's_ … _good_."

" _Do you want to watch a movie? You haven't seen the Star Trek reboot yet_."

Lucifer sighed and she  _felt_  a spark of his frustration. " _I can't stay for a movie. If I'm out too often the demons will get suspicious, and I don't want them to find you, I'm afraid of what might happen_." He drew back. " _I don't want to leave_."

" _I understand_." Liz nodded. One day his divided loyalties would be a problem.

" _I'll come over on Saturday, we'll watch it then_." He promised.

" _Alright I'll see you on Saturday_."

"Goodbye."

"Goodbye."

He gave the her one last look and then disappeared.


	13. Chapter 13

Even though it was late autumn, the temperature in southern California was hot enough to make the king of hell uncomfortable. And even though both Meg and Crowley had given him strange looks Lucifer had given up toughing it out, and bought a bottle of water from a street vendor.

He was almost disappointed that neither of them made a sarcastic comment, he would have loved to turn them both to ashes. They had both been grating on his nerves lately. All of the demons were getting on his nerves more often. It seemed the more time he spent among them; the more he wanted to disintegrate the lot of them.

He had concluded his business with the demons and was now sitting at a table outside a café, just watching the clouds. He was considering texting Liz, to see what she was up to. But then out of the corner of his eye he thought he saw her.

She rounded the corner into an alleyway, and Lucifer got up immediately to go after her.

"Liz!" he called as soon as he saw her. But then he realized his mistake. Even before she even turned around he knew that this wasn't Elizabeth Holloway.

This woman was about the same height as Liz, and had a similar figure. Their facial structures were also similar.

But this woman's hair was worn down in a Grecian style. She was wearing a tight dress that looked expensive and ridiculous looking decorative sunglasses. Liz always just wore her hair down and usually just dressed in graphic tees, jeans, and her leather jacket. This woman's eyes were a dark green, where Liz's were an impossibly bright blue.

And Liz's eyes were almost always warm and kind. As she studied him, this woman's eyes were ice cold and uncaring.

"Oh, sorry. I mistook you for someone else." Lucifer said, a little embarrassed.

The woman took a step toward him. "And how exactly does the devil know my little sister?" She asked dangerously. She sounded for all the world like an over protective big sibling. But Lucifer found it unlikely that Morgan Holloway cared about the sister she betrayed.

"We're friends." Lucifer's fingers flexed, missing the reassuring weight of his blade. He could summon it in an instant, if he needed it; and Lucifer had a feeling that he would need it soon.

Morgan rolled her eyes and muttered something about Liz and her tendencies to bring home strays. "And how exactly did you meet?" She asked.

"I don't see how that's any of your business." Lucifer said coolly. He was a little offended by being referred to as a 'stray.'

Morgan smirked. "Oh I see, you're the mysterious gentleman who keeps showing up at my sister's door. Well I know my sister is fine with consorting with the vermin that are in New York, but this is a whole new level, even for her."

"Excuse me?" Lucifer asked hotly.

"You heard me." Morgan was almost in his face now. She looked him over, and then with an evil smirk she added; "And honestly I'm surprised you have the courage to go out in public at all."

"What are you  _talking_  about?"

"I'd be very self-conscious if I had burnt wings like yours."

Lucifer took a step back, horrified. He kept the true condition of his wings a hidden with a glamor, and they were normally hidden in the duat while he was on Earth. How did Morgan know?

"I can see into the duat, and my glasses allow me see past glamors." Morgan said. And that was creepy, how did she know what he was thinking?

"You know I don't blame you for hiding them, they really are an eyesore." Morgan continued.

Lucifer recomposed himself. "Are you really just going to stand there throwing juvenile insults at me? I thought we were more mature then that."

Morgan made a hurt face that was obviously fake. "What a defensive tone. And I thought maybe we could be friends. We're not so different, you and I."

Lucifer scoffed. "The way I see it, you fall in the 'bitchy older sibling' column, and I want revenge on my bitch of an older brother. We have nothing in common."

"Wow." Morgan regarded him coldly. "You're really carrying a torch for my sister, aren't you?"

"And if I am?"

"Oh please, I know my sister. When push comes to shove, do you really think that she'll do the same for you? You are the devil, after all."

"You know what; there are a few people who I would be willing to have this conversation with. You aren't one of them."

"No. You aren't willing to have this conversation at all." She turned and started walking away. "Have a nice day." She called as she turned the corner.

Lucifer zapped himself back to his office. The whole exchange had been nerve wracking. Liz had always been a calming presence, but her sister seemed to know all the right buttons to press to get him worked up.

" _When push comes to shove, do you really think that she'll do the same for you_?"

But worst of all, Lucifer had a sick feeling that this wouldn't be the last he saw of Morgan Holloway.

***SPN***

Liz was playing her guitar in the middle of central park, which was probably a sign of the apocalypse (or you know, it would be if the apocalypse wasn't already happening).

She had been initially pretty nervous but after playing Crazy Train and drawing a decent size crowd she began to relax. But even so, the only reason Liz was doing this was because she was working a case.

For the past two months street performers had been disappearing off the streets. The locations were all different. Some disappeared from subway stops and others from central park. And it wasn't just one area, people were disappearing from all over central park, and multiple subway stops.

Liz didn't like this at all. It either meant that a monster went rouge and was killing people, a serial killer was on the loose, or there was a kidnapping ring operating in New York. If it was the last two options she would find out everything she could and take it to the police. If it was the first option, she would have to kill whoever it was. It wasn't something she wanted to do; whoever it was would most likely be someone Liz knew. But the only reason New York City wasn't a large ash pile is because of order; because people followed the rules, and because she enforced those rules. So if people didn't follow the rules they faced the consequences. If Liz started to let people get away with things, order would be destroyed and all hell would break loose.

So she had set herself up as bait, hoping whoever it was would take it.

Liz went through multiple rock songs that everyone knew, and before long she had a sizable amount of money in her guitar case. She also noticed that she had a stalker. A man in a hood and sunglasses was watching her, and was too far away to be listening to the music.

She played until it started to get dark, then packed up and left. She stayed on guard but there was no sign of anyone following her. Liz was probably going to have to do this a few more times before the fish took the bait.

But now she was almost late. Liz was working a shift at a nearby soup kitchen and she had a reputation for never being late for these things.

Liz stepped into the place and immediately let her guard down. She knew most of the patrons by name and the place was run by one of her cousins.

Then her phone beeped, telling her that she had a text message. As she was distracted pulling her phone out, Liz felt a sharp pain on the side of her neck. She vaguely realized that she had dropped her phone. Then the world tilted and everything went black.

***SPN***

Chris Miller was getting anxious. His third cousin, Elizabeth, was supposed to have shown up fifteen minutes ago.

He decided to call her, to see if she had forgotten or lost track of the time. But both of those seemed unlikely, Liz was never late.

He called her number and from the other side of the room he heard "So What" by P!nk. The song Liz had assigned as his ringtone as a joke.

With a growing sense of dread, he rushed to the source of the music. There was an iPhone on the floor by the door. It was Liz's. He knew she would never willingly leave that phone anywhere.

Even though his side of the family had stopped hunting, Chris knew Liz was up to her ears in the supernatural goings-on of this city. And if he had to guess, that was how she had been taken right under everyone's noses.

It was time to call Gilgamesh.

***SPN***

Liz woke up with a blinding headache, freezing cold, and without a clue as to where she was. Then it all came back to her. She had been kidnapped by the people she had been trying to trap. That was embarrassing.

Liz sat up slowly and focused on her surroundings. She was lying on the wooden floor of a small windowless room without any furnishings. She still was wearing her leather jacket, thank god. That meant she still had her blade (it was in a hidden compartment in her sleeve) and her lock picking tools.

Before she could start planning ways to get out of the room, the door opened and two men entered. They pulled Liz to her feet and dragged her out of the room and down the hallway.

Liz offered them only token resistance; there was no sense in escaping before she found out what was going on.

She was led into a large, dome shaped room and cuffed to a chair. The cuffs were warded heavily and Liz knew that whoever designed them was good. She wouldn't be able to work any Egyptian magic while she was trapped by them.

Then the pieces clicked into place. The wards, the kidnappings, the fact that Liz was freezing cold but she couldn't see her breath. The puzzle was completed but she didn't like the picture.

Then she heard a familiar voice from behind her. "Ah, Liz! I'm so glad you could make it."

And suddenly Liz was very, very afraid.

***SPN***

Gilgamesh was worried about Liz. She had disappeared almost twelve hours before; and to be honest, he was freaking out.

Normally when Liz was involved in something unusually dangerous she would let him know. But they hadn't spoken since their falling out a few weeks back. And if he was honest, he hadn't really been aware of Liz's activities since their argument almost two years ago. Liz had grown used to not having anyone for backup, and he hadn't stepped in like he should of.

Gilgamesh got up to make himself more coffee. He was at Liz's apartment, trying to find something,  _anything_ , that might clue him into whatever Liz had gotten herself into. The problem was that Liz probably had kept her notes in her journal, and at some point she must have revoked his access.

As Gilgamesh poured himself another cup of coffee, Liz's phone buzzed and the screen lit up displaying that it had received another text message from "Hell Boy" (Liz gave everyone nicknames in her contacts, Gilgamesh was 'The Original Grumpy Old Man'). Gilgamesh had no desire to speak to Satan so he ignored it.

Then there was a knock at the door. Gilgamesh figured that it was Athena or Sif so he went opened the door. But standing in the hallway was not Athena or Sif, but the devil himself.

"Leave." Gilgamesh ordered as he closed the door and began to walk away.

"No." Lucifer caught the door before it shut and walked into the apartment. "What happened, where's Liz?"

"Listen, Liz may trust you, but I don't. And I'm sure as hell not working with the devil." Gilgamesh growled.

"Listen, you aren't exactly my favorite person either. But Liz is in trouble, I can feel it. And I'm willing to set this feud of ours aside for her sake. The question is, are you?"

Gilgamesh sighed. He reminded himself that even if he was the devil, Lucifer was the reason Liz had opened up again. And even if he was loath to admit it, Lucifer probably did know Liz better than he did at this point and he might pick up on smaller clues that he wouldn't. "Alright listen up…" Gilgamesh told Lucifer everything he knew.

Lucifer rubbed the nape of his neck. "Let me see the journal."

Gilgamesh blinked. "What?"

"I have access, let me look through it."

Gilgamesh grudgingly handed over the journal.

Lucifer quickly ran his fingers down the cover and opened the journal. "It looks like Liz was investigating kidnappings." He held the journal out and Gilgamesh took it. "Who would kidnap street performers?" Lucifer asked.

"Hungry monsters, serial killers, might even be a kidnapping ring." Gilgamesh said.

They were interrupted by Gilgamesh's phone ringing. He answered it. "Hello?"

"Gilgamesh, it's Joran." Joran Fastblade was the local Oberon, maybe one of his sprites had found Liz.

"Hey, Joran. Any news?" Gilgamesh asked.

"Beren was found dead. And all of the monitoring information for the last two months has gone missing." Beren was in charge of monitoring chaos energy around the city. If he was dead… "

Gilgamesh sighed. He did not want to have to deal with chaos demons today. "This is surprising behavior, even for them."

"Chaos Demons have certainly gotten bold if they're setting up operations in New York." Joran agreed.

Lucifer must have been following the conversation because his eyes narrowed when Joran mentioned chaos demons.

"Alright, thanks Joran. Call me if you find out anything else."

"I will." Then there was a click that let him know that Joran had hung up.

Gilgamesh put his phone back in his jacket pocket. "Goddam chaos demons, of course Liz would get mixed up in this."

Lucifer frowned. "If chaos demons have been running around New York and they haven't been noticed, they must be heavily warded. How are we supposed to find them?"

"Research." Gilgamesh responded. "We need to search police reports for anything out of the ordinary."

"Out of the ordinary?" Lucifer replied, looking stricken. "This is  _New York_."

"I know." Gilgamesh sighed. They had a long night ahead of them.

***SPN***

Liz felt like an idiot. She should have realized sooner. Hell, she should have been able to put the pieces together as soon as she  _woke up_. Liz had always felt cold in the presence of chaos demons, she should have realized who her captors were when she woke up  _freezing_!

She glared at her captor. "Hello Blake." She spat out his name like it was the worst insult she could think of.

The chaos demon only smiled down at her, like they were old friends meeting for lunch or something. "I've been waiting a long time for you to figure it out. It's been two months Lizzy; I think you've been losing your touch."

"I'm sorry I just didn't think you would be stupid enough to set up shop in my city." Liz bit back. "So, Blake, what have you been doing these past few months? Don't hold back any details; I've been  _dying_  to know."

"Well, you remember Wisconsin, don't you?"

Of course she did, Wisconsin still haunted her in her nightmares. "Didn't you try to kill me and attempt to turn human souls into chaos demons?"

"Oh, so you do remember!" He clapped his hands together. "But you see, this fresh start in New York was just what I needed. I finally figured out how to turn human souls into chaos demons! You see, you need to torture the soul; you need to shred it beyond repair and then pour corruption into it." Blake explained calmly.

"I don't even get it, why do you even want to make chaos demons out of humans? Doesn't Apophis fashion you guys from his unholy wrath?" Liz asked.

Blake grinned evilly. "Well you can never have too many soldiers for a war." Oh please, no. One apocalypse is enough for a lifetime. Continuing on, he said; "I just can't wait to see you when I finish corrupting you."

"What?" Liz asked, trying to mask her panic.

"Oh please. I know you try to keep you soul hidden with that leather jacket of yours, but don't ever forget that I've seen it. I've seen that raw untapped power. When I'm finished with you, you might even be stronger than I am." He turned away and began arranging wicked looking blades on a table.

Liz pressed her hands against the cuffs holding her to the chair. She felt her palms grow hot and under her grip the cuffs began to melt. "Nice plan, Blake. But you've forgotten one very important detail."

He didn't even bother to turn around. "Oh really, and what's that?"

"I'm already stronger than you are." The cuffs melted off and Liz lunged forward, letting her blade fall into her hand.

At the last possible second Blake turned around and parried her blade with one of his own.

"How is this possible! Those cuffs were warded!" Blake growled. He swung at Liz but she easily deflected it. "Unless… you're a pyromancer  _and_  a magician? That's just not fair."

Then someone grabbed her arm from behind. She spun around and cut the hand off the thing that grabbed her. Then she heard Blake move forward from behind her and she spun around again to only block his thrust just in time.

Liz backed up a step and cursed herself for forgetting the other chaos demons. They had her surrounded. Counting Blake there was six of them.

But evidently Blake forgot who he was dealing with. She was Elizabeth Holloway; the girl who walked into the fortress of Nix with two cats and a dog for backup, slew Erebus- the son of Apophis, rescued Death, and came out unscathed.

It was six to one. But you had to feel sorry for them.

She launched herself at the nearest chaos demon, taking it by surprise. She stabbed him in the throat and flung the body at the body at the demon to her right; they both crumpled to the ground. The demon who had grabbed her before stepped in with a thrust to her side. But she deflected it, twisted her blade and disarmed him. Liz stabbed him with his own blade. Then she hurled it at the next demon, it took him square in the chest and he went down too. By then the second demon had gotten himself out from under his fallen comrade, and he grabbed her from behind, pinned her arms, and lifted her a few feet off the ground. The final demon came at her with his blade raised. When he got within reach she kicked at him, breaking the bones in his sword arm. Liz twisted violently in the second demon's arms. He dropped her in surprise and she stabbed him in the chest. And then, in one neat fluid motion, she beheaded the final demon.

Liz looked at the five corpses strewn across the room. Where the hell was Blake!? She turned around toward the exit; and on the door was a post-it that read "Better luck next time!"

He had gotten away.

***SPN***

Lucifer was frustrated. They had been looking at police reports for two hours and still they found nothing.

Then Gilgamesh's cellphone rang. He snatched up the device and answered it right away. "Hello?"

"Hey, Gil." Even though it wasn't on speaker he heard Liz's reply.

"Where in the blue blazes have you been!" Gilgamesh shouted.

"Calm down, man. I've been working a case!"

"A case, my ass. You've been missing for over fourteen hours!"

"Put the phone on speaker." Lucifer ordered. And too late he realized that he probably shouldn't order Gilgamesh around. The man hit him with a withering glare and Lucifer actually took a step back before he could stop himself.

"Hey wait, is that Lucifer?" Liz asked. "Can you put it on speaker?" Gilgamesh obliged her and but the phone on speaker.

"Liz, where are you?" Lucifer asked.

Liz rattled of the address; and before Gilgamesh could protest Lucifer grabbed his shoulder and flew them to Liz. In half a second they were standing in front of her.

Lucifer swept her up in a fierce hug and Liz returned it. " _I was worried about you_." He told her.

" _Oh please; there were only six of them. They didn't stand a chance_."

Behind him Gilgamesh cleared his throat and Liz pulled away.

"Are you okay?" Gilgamesh asked.

Liz shrugged. "I'm not injured."

"Good, that's good." Gilgamesh sighed. "Look, Liz. I'm sorry I yelled at you the other day. You're an adult now and I need to respect your decisions."

Liz nodded. "Thank you, Gil."

"So, are you gonna tell us what happened?" Lucifer asked.

"I was working a case on street performers that had gone missing. And to catch the culprit I allowed myself to be kidnapped. So it turns out that it was Blake." Liz paused. "And he finished what he was working on in Wisconsin."

Liz and Gilgamesh exchanged a meaningful look and Lucifer was feeling left out.

"Wait hold on. What happened in Wisconsin?" Lucifer asked.

"Nothing, don't worry about it." Gilgamesh said.

Then there was a beep from Gilgamesh's phone signaling that he had gotten a text.

He pulled his phone out. "May I?"

"Sure, go ahead." Liz told him.

Gilgamesh checked the message. "It's Chester."

"Chester?" Lucifer asked, not recognizing the name.

"Chester Lionel Douglas MacArthur; you met him, right? Anyway, Gilgamesh insists on calling him Chester." Liz explained.

"So apparently Daphne Howitzer is currently involved in a shouting match with the mayor." Gilgamesh said.

Liz snorted. "It's his fault for trying to get that anti-vampire legislation passed."

Gilgamesh sighed. "I better go break it up before someone gets killed."

"Do you need help?" Lucifer asked.

"No I got it." He waved him off. "Liz, I want you to go home."

Liz looked like she wanted to argue, but she eventually nodded her agreement. She turned to Lucifer. "Do you mind giving me a lift?"

Lucifer shook his head in response.

"Alright, good bye Gil." Liz said.

"Yeah, I'll see you later." Gilgamesh responded. Then he turned and walked away.

Lucifer put his hand on Liz's shoulder and zapped them back to her apartment. The moment they touched down Lucifer swept Liz up in another hug.

She seemed surprised, but she returned it. " _I really am okay_."

" _I know, I know. But,_ fuck _, you scared me. We're bonded, I'm supposed to be there for you, I'm supposed to fight with you._ "

" _I can take care of myself, you know_." Liz said gently. " _I've taken on more by myself_."

" _But you shouldn't have to. When you disappeared I didn't even_ _ **know**_ _at first. I just had the terrible feeling that something was wrong. And then when I came to New York, and you were missing; the only thing I could think was that I failed you._ "

" _But you didn't. I promise you, you didn't._ " Liz pressed her mouth to his in a rough kiss.

Lucifer responded eagerly, parting his lips to allow her better access. Her fingers carded through his hair. And his hands swept up and down her back.

Eventually Liz had to come up for air. " _You okay_?"

" _Yeah_." Liz was safe and here, how could he not be? But if he was honest with himself, in the back of his mind the memory of his conversation with Morgan Holloway troubled him.

And Liz must have sensed it too. " _Are you sure you're okay_?"

" _Yeah, it's just… I realized I haven't shown you my wings yet_." Lucifer didn't want to tell her about Morgan, Liz would just worry if she knew. But the conversation with Morgan had made Lucifer realize that Liz hadn't seen his wings yet. Even if he wasn't proud of them, it seemed wrong that the woman he was bonded with hadn't seen them yet. " _I mean, if you want to see them_."

Liz smiled. " _I'd love to_."

Taking a deep breath, Lucifer summoned his wings from the duat.

The first time they had met Lucifer had shown her the shadow of his wings. But this was different. He had fully summoned his wings. The large bird-like appendages were almost ten feet long fully spread, but he had to keep them slightly folded so they fit in the apartment. Once upon a time they had been bright silver. But the hell fire had burned them, turned them the color of fireplace soot. And across the left wing was a long, thin scar; a reminder of the time Michael cast him from heaven.

Liz's eyes were wide as she examined them. " _They're magnificent_."

Lucifer felt himself blush. The way she looked at them, with wonder and amazement, he almost believed it.

She reached out to touch them but hesitated. " _May I_?"

It took him a second to realize what she was asking. " _Sure, go ahead_." He spread out his wing a little more to give her better access.

Her fingers began tracing a path through the feathers and Lucifer tried not to focus on how  _good_  it felt. And when her fingers dug through the feathers to the sensitive skin underneath he had to bite down hard on his cheek to stop a groan from escaping.

Then she withdrew her hand and Lucifer tried not to feel disappointed.

" _You haven't seen my soul, yet_." Liz said quietly. Liz was never without her leather jacket, and it hid her soul. Lucifer had always thought that it was just paranoia.

Liz pulled the jacket off quickly and it immediately became clear why she kept her soul hidden.

Normally, before a human even turned four there would be some measure of corruption on their soul. All humans were like that, even the ones who went to heaven had some taint to their soul. But not Liz.

Her soul was completely pure.

Now that is was free of its restrains, her soul meshed with his grace because of their bond; and a warm kind of contentment filled him and left him momentarily stunned.

Liz seemed tense, so Lucifer extended his wing and wrapped it around her, drawing her closer.

" _You are_ so _beautiful_." He murmured as she rested her head against his shoulder. And he closed his eyes for a moment, just enjoying the contact with her soul.

He understood why she had kept her soul hidden. In the soul trade, the purer the soul the more it was worth. That was why pagans preferred virgin sacrifices. If it became well known that Liz, a full grown human, had a completely pure soul everyone and their brother would be coming to New York to try and buy it or steal it.

" _Liz, how is it even possible for your soul to be this pure_?" Lucifer asked.

She looked him right in the eye as she answered. " _I'm the Eye of Ra_."

She was Ra's true vessel. Lucifer could have smacked himself for not getting it sooner. Liz was an Egyptian sorcerer, a group notorious for their abilities to host pagans and angels; she a had Stygian blade, a metal so rare it's practically nonexistent, and the blade itself looked exactly like the weapon Ra had fought with in the war against chaos; Liz can perfectly draw Ra's first children (the dragons) despite the fact that no one had seen them for eons; and she had even  _told_  him that she was a vessel. He should have put the pieces together as soon as he saw Liz's soul, if not before that.

" _That seems…_   _pretty obvious in retrospect. I don't know how I missed it_." Lucifer smiled at her.

Liz returned the smile. " _Don't feel bad, I've been more obvious to people that I've known longer and they haven't gotten it yet_."

" _Liz, I'm glad you chose to share this with me_." Lucifer said, turning serious. He knew she must trust him a lot for her to be able to show him this.

" _I'm glad too._   _I can feel the bond more strongly now_."

" _So can I_." Lucifer was glad she could feel the connection the same way he could.

She snuggled up closer to him. " _Can you stay the night_?"

There were a million reasons why he shouldn't. But he found himself saying; " _Of course I can_." And wrapping his wing tighter around her in spite of those reasons.

And just before he drifted off into unconsciousness for exactly the second time in his life, for one shining moment, he was the happiest guy in the world.


	14. Chapter 14

It had been three weeks since Liz had had that whole misadventure with the chaos demons; three weeks since they had shared their secrets.

Lucifer was coming around almost every other night now. Liz still wore her jacket in public at all times; but when they just stayed in Liz would take it off. He was coming around frequently enough that he sometimes had to go on patrol with her. He got along great with the werewolves and skinwalkers. And while they were too proud to admit it the he had earned a grudging respect from the vampires after he saved Daphne Howitzer's husband, Matt, from death at the hands of a rival nest. He was still a little uncomfortable talking to pagans, but when he wanted to he had a charming demeanor. And most of the pagans liked him even though he was an "arrogant westerner."

He also would come with her when she got called in to do work at the museum. She protested that he would be bored, but Lucifer insisted that he loved watching her work. He just seemed happy to spend time with her.

Before Lucifer had been careful in the amount of time he spent with Liz. He had said that he didn't want the demons noticing he was gone. But now he obviously didn't care anymore because he was here more often than not.

She still hadn't told Gabriel, she wasn't sure how he would take it. And he was almost never in New York anyway.

There was a knock at the door, shaking Liz out of her thoughts. She opened it and standing outside her door was Jo Harvelle.

"Hey Jo, it's been a while." Liz said.

"Yeah, it has. Can I come in?" Jo asked.

"Yeah, sure." William and Ellen had been friends with Liz's parents. Liz had been to the roadhouse a couple times and had struck up a quick friendship with Jo. They hadn't talked in a few years, though.

Jo sat down at the table and Liz sat down across from her. "So, what brings you to New York?"

"You know about the apocalypse, right?"

"Jo, I don't live under a rock."

"We have a way to kill the devil."

"How do you plan to do that? There aren't many things that can kill an archangel."

"We have the Samuel Colt's magic gun. It can kill anything."

Liz nodded. "Who's we?"

"Me, my mom, a rebel angel, and the Winchester brothers"

"Yeah I had heard that Dean Winchester had the colt." Liz smirked. "You're all crazy."

"It sounds like something you would do." Jo pointed out.

"Exactly." Liz shook her head. "Well I wish you all luck."

"I'm actually here for a reason. Dean sent me."

"Dean has my number."

"Well he figured you wouldn't want to talk to him. And we need your help."

"I can't."

"Why can't you?" Jo demanded.

Because she was in love with the devil. "Because I have to stay in New York."

"You've left for short trips before." Jo argued.

"I made a deal." Liz sighed.

"You WHAT!?"

"Not that kind of deal, it's more of an agreement. They stay out of New York and I leave them alone."

"Liz how could you do that? You're the one person who could really make a difference!"

"How could I do that? Really? You know about the Leygate! You know that if it's activated a gateway to the sea of chaos will open and reality will unravel!" Liz took a breath. "Jo chaos energy levels are spiking worldwide. I can't leave New York, and risk there being an attack while I'm gone. I want to help but I literally have the weight of the universe on my shoulders." Liz had just been trying to come up with an excuse so she wouldn't have to help kill Lucifer. But it wasn't until she said the words that she realized how true they were. It was hard and everything was complicated.

"You're right." Jo sighed. "I'm sorry. You've got enough on your plate"

"I want to help. I just can't."

Jo nodded. "I should go. We've got planning to do."

Liz nodded. "Tell Dean I said hi."

"I will." Jo got up and began walking out. "Goodbye."

"Goodbye." She called. But Jo was already out the door.

Liz sighed and buried her face in her hands. When did everything become so  _complicated_?

***SPN***

Lucifer was trying to get all the necessary ingredients to bind Death.

He was also trying to shove aside the guilt he had about this. It was Liz's fault, definitely. He was becoming sympathetic. The problem was he couldn't bring himself to care.

Lucifer was digging through a warehouse, trying to find a dragon scale for the spell. He heard the warehouse doors open and close behind him.

"Father?" It's Meg. He mentally cringes every time the demon calls him that.

"Hello Meg." Lucifer doesn't look up from his search. "Can I help you?"

"Well, I've noticed that you've been gone a lot these past few weeks. And nobody seems to know where you're going."

"It's nothing to worry about." Lucifer said dismissively.

"But there are some nasty rumors going around. Some people are saying that you've been hanging out with a  _human_."

Lucifer froze at those words.  _She knew_. How did she know? "Have they forgotten who I am? Have they forgotten who created them?" He tried to sound angry, dad knows that before meeting Elizabeth Holloway he would have been furious at the very suggestion.

"Well you're never around, who is supposed to remind them?" Meg challenged.

He turned around. "I am the king! I don't need to clear everything I do with underlings like you!" Lucifer growled.

"You are the king, and you have a duty to us." Meg shouted. She took a deep breath and continued in a calmer voice. "I can barely recognize you. I look at you and I don't see the daring angel who defied God himself; not anymore."

Lucifer looked at her in disbelief, never had any demon been this outspoken with him. "Have  _you_  forgotten who I am too, Meg?"

"Oh I remember. I wish the same could be said for you. You need to decide where your loyalties lie. Are they with this human bitch of yours; or with us?" Meg turned around and walked toward the warehouse door. "You need to decide."

And before Lucifer could respond, she was gone. 


	15. Chapter 15

It had been a week since Liz had seen Jo, and two days since she had went with the Winchesters to help kill Lucifer.

Ellen had told Liz what had happened. They had walked into the disserted town and waiting for them had been a crossroads demon and her hellhound. When they had tried to run the hell mutt caught up to them and clawed up Jo. Sam had managed to kill it with a knife of the Kurds but the damage had been done. Ellen had barricaded herself in the general store with a deteriorating Jo; while the Winchesters had gone on to kill Lucifer. And as it turns out the colt couldn't kill him anyway. Lucifer had raised Death and disappeared. Then they rushed Jo to the nearest hospital.

Now the Winchesters and their angel were two states over working with Bobby on trying to decipher omens. And Jo Harvelle was in the ICU, in a coma. And they didn't know if she would ever wake up.

"How are you holding up?" Liz asked Ellen.

"I'm fine." Ellen sighed. "I just keep thinking; her dad died like this, all clawed up by some beast."

"I should have been there." Liz shook her head. "I should have…"

"Liz." Ellen interrupted. "If you had been there you might be in a similar state. And you have other responsibilities. No one blames you for not being there."

"I do."

"Well you were always the most critical of yourself." Ellen sighed.

After a long silence Liz's phone beeped. She checked it and rolled her eyes. "Ellen, I've got to go do something."

"Liz, take care of yourself. Don't do anything stupid." Ellen said as Liz began walking towards the door.

"Ellen, this is me we're talking about." Liz turned around to face Ellen and forced a cocky grin.

Liz heard Ellen sigh again as she exited the room.

***SPN***

It had been a day since Liz had visited Jo in the hospital, and Liz was exhausted. Zeus had  _somehow_  insulted Fenrir and Liz had had to break it up. Breaking up a grudge match between two pissed off pagan gods isn't fun.

All Liz really wanted to do was plop down on her couch and not get up for the next century or so. So when Liz got home she showered and changed into clothes what weren't bloodstained; but before she could sit down there was a knock at the door.

" _Hello_." Lucifer smiled as she opened the door.

" _Hey, come on in_." All Liz felt was dread, at what she was about to do.

Lucifer came into the apartment. " _Are you okay_? _Because you look like something's bothering you_."

Liz spoke aloud. "Yeah, a friend of mine is in the hospital. Jo Harvelle was clawed up by a hell hound." Liz closed off her end of the bond; this would be hard enough without him being able to decipher her every emotion.

The smile drops off Lucifer's face, and it was replaced by something unreadable. "They were trying to kill me…"

"With a weapon that you knew wouldn't work against you." Liz interrupted.

They glared at each other for a moment. Then Lucifer shook his head. "What do you want me to say? You've always known who I am. I don't understand what you want."

"I want to understand." Liz fought to keep her voice steady. "Why do you keep coming back?"

"I thought I had already explained this." He said. "You're not like other humans."

"You keep saying that. You don't seem to realize how untrue that is. I'm not extraordinary."

"Oh, don't give me that; Look at everything you've done."

"I'm a stubborn ass with a little bit of magic. That isn't anything special; I was just born at the right place. I'm human, and you saying that I'm not like other humans means nothing."

"It doesn't mean nothing." He looked almost offended.

He opened his mouth to continue but Liz interrupted him again. "It does when you want TO DESTROY MY ENTIRE SPECIES!"

He opened and closed his mouth. "I don't understand what you want." He repeated.

"I want you to leave, and don't come back." Lucifer reacted like he'd been slapped. But Liz continued on. "You're going to go through with the apocalypse. No matter who wins, heaven or hell, you and your brother are still going to roast the planet. I can't stand at your side while you kill them all; I'm sorry but I can't." And fuck, she was crying now. She hated herself for crying.

"No, your right, this couldn't have worked anyway. I'm sorry for putting you in this position. It was selfish of me." His voice sounded strangled. "Goodbye Elizabeth Holloway. It's been a pleasure."

And then he was gone; and no matter how much Liz tried to tell herself that it was the right thing, it still felt like there was a hole in her chest. 


	16. Chapter 16

It had been about two months since Liz had broken up with him, and it still hurt. There would be days when he thought he was over it. But then he would see or hear something that he knew Liz would enjoy and it would just crash into him that he couldn't tell her about it. And it hurt.

And he wasn't even mad at her. He couldn't fault her for breaking up with him. She was right, he was bringing the apocalypse and she was human. It would have hurt worse later if she had died. Liz had done what needed to be done, even if he didn't like it. Lucifer wasn't mad at her.

He was mad at himself. If he had looked where he was going and not crashed into the Empire State Building, if he had not come back to New York when she had prayed to him, if he had never allowed himself to become her friend… he wouldn't be walking around with a broken heart. It was his fault entirely.

Then when Mercury (someone Liz had introduced him too) had called him on his phone (the phone Liz gave him) he had had the distinct urge to throw it into the river outside his hotel. But he had answered it anyway. And it turns that a large group of pagan gods were planning to kill him. Oh, joy. He was considering ignoring the whole thing, because they couldn't actually kill him, but then Mercury had let slip that Loki (aka Gabriel) and the Winchesters were there. Gabriel did actually have a weapon that would work on him so that was worrying, and he needed Sam because Nick wouldn't last forever.

Lucifer tried to ignore the memory of Liz saying " _I know about the whole vessel thing. And by the way, speaking as someone who is a vessel themselves, it's so very not cool_."

So he walked into the Elysian Fields Hotel and rang the bell at the front desk. Mercury turned around to greet him.

"Checking in." Lucifer said casually.

"Lucifer, thanks for coming."

"Oh, you did right calling me."

"It's just... The way the talk is heading in there, it's... it's insane!" Mercury said.

Lucifer gestured towards the door. "Mercury, I think it's time for you to leave now."

Mercury nodded and ran out the doors so fast Lucifer was almost impressed.

Lucifer walked through the hall, not particularly rushed. He could hear conversation deeper in the hotel and he strolled toward the source of the sound. Then out of nowhere Odin charged at him. He caught the pagan in a headlock and applied pressure to his skull until he passed out. Ganesh ran at him too, but Lucifer used Ganesh's momentum to flip him over his shoulder and into a wall. Once Lucifer was satisfied that Ganesh wouldn't be getting up for a while he walked on.

Before he had met Liz he would have slaughtered these pagans without a second thought. But now his instinct was to disarm, not to kill.

He walked into a large room just to here Dean Winchester say; "Shazzam us outta here, would ya?"

And Baldur reply; "We can't."

Lucifer spoke up. "Of course you can't. You didn't say 'mother, may I?'" the occupants of the room turned to face him. "Sam, Dean, good to see you again."

Baldur started forward towards him.

"Baldur, don't!" Kali warned, but Baldur didn't listen.

"You think you own the planet?" Baldur snarled, getting in Lucifer's face. "What gives you the right?"

Lucifer smirked with a cockiness he didn't feel, and said; "No one gives us the right, we take it."

Lucifer tapped Baldur's forehead and the pagan crumpled the ground, unconscious.

Kali looked enraged. She engulfed her arms in fire and threw it at him. It may have been deadly to other pagans or mortals, but all he felt was a slight tickling sensation. In the corner of his eye he saw the Winchester boys jump behind a table for cover.

Then the fire stopped and Kali looked terrified at the sight of him standing there unharmed. He closed the distance between them and punched her in the chin, sending her flying.

Lucifer was about to knock her out too, but before he could he was pushed backwards by a familiar power.

When he looked up, Gabriel was standing between him and Kali, wielding his blade.

"Luci, I'm home." Gabriel said. Same old Gabriel, it's nice to know that some things never change.

Gabriel picked up Kali and called to the Winchesters "Guys! Get her outta here!"

The brothers come out from underneath the table and rushed Kali out of the room, Gabriel between them the entire time.

"Over a girl. Gabriel, really?" Lucifer was a hypocrite; he would have done the same thing for Liz.

Gabriel ignored his sentence. "Lucifer, you're my brother. And I love you. But you are a great big bag of dicks."

"Wait, what did you just say to me?"

"Look at yourself! Boo hoo! Daddy was mean to me, so I'm gonna smash up all his toys."

"Watch your tone." Lucifer warned. Gabriel had always known him best, and Gabriel was probably going to call him out on all his shit. But Lucifer didn't want to hear it.

"Play the victim all you want. But you and me? We know the truth. Dad loved you best. More than Michael, more than me. Then he brought the new baby home and you couldn't handle it. So this is all just one big temper tantrum. Time to grow up."

The words hit him like a slap but Lucifer worked not to show it. "Gabriel, if you're doing this for Michael..."

"Screw him." Gabriel interrupts. "If he were standing here, I'd shiv his ass too."

"You disloyal…"

Gabriel interrupted again. "Oh, I'm loyal, to them!"

"Who? These so called Gods?"

"To people, Lucifer, people."

"So you're willing to die, for the humans. Why?"

"Because Dad was right. They are better than us."

"They are broken. Flawed!" But the words rang false in his ears.

"Damn right they're flawed. But a lot of them try. To do better, to forgive. And you should see the Spearmint Rhino! I've been riding the pine a long time. But I'm in the game now, and I'm not on your side, or Michael's. I'm on theirs."

Gabriel was going to try to kill him, but he couldn't let him. "Brother, don't make me do this."

"No one makes us do anything." Gabriel smiles sadly.

"I know you think you're doing the right thing, Gabriel, but…" Lucifer stopped talking and turns around; grabbing the real Gabriel's wrist, disarming him, pinning him against the far wall, and putting the blade to his throat.

"Amateur hocus pocus. Don't forget, you learned all your tricks from me, little brother." Lucifer smirked.

But the smirk faded away when he saw the  _fear_  in Gabriel's eyes. And that fear was enough to give him pause.

This was Gabriel. The brother he'd raised. The brother he taught how to talk, and fly. The brother he'd played with and argued with and pulled pranks with. The brother who had defended him at first when Michael accused him. Could he really live with himself if he killed Gabriel?

And then for the first time, Lucifer actually considered Gabriel's argument. Yeah humans could be terrible, but they also had the capacity for good. Just look at Liz. Her flaws didn't take away from her; they were part of who she was. And to be honest her flaws were part of the reason why he liked her. If she was as flawless as angels were supposed to be he wouldn't ever have grown to love her.

Lucifer considered his father, who had to know about this. He considered the fact that he and Liz had met and become friends by way too many coincidences.

For the first time Lucifer considered all this and wondered. He wondered if the apocalypse was a test. Maybe he was being tested on if he could learn and mature and forgive. Maybe he had met Liz for a reason. So he could see that humans weren't as bad as he had first believed.

Maybe the ending wasn't set in stone.

Lucifer let Gabriel off the wall and dropped the blade. Then he vanished.

***SPN***

Jo Harvelle sat by the water's edge. She couldn't recall exactly how long she had been there.

She knew that she had been clawed up by a hell hound, and she knew she was in a coma. But she knew these things in a detached way, like they were things that had happened to a stranger.

Then suddenly there was a presence beside her. "Hello Jo." The new man said.

Jo was a little surprised; in all her time by the water's edge no one else had come to visit her. "Hello, who are you?"

"My name is Lucifer." The man said.

Jo scrambled to her feet, panicked. "How are you…?"

"I'm not here to hurt you Jo." Lucifer interrupted. "I'm just here to fix what I've done."

A white energy filled the air and Jo screamed, she didn't believe for one second that the devil had good intentions.

Then she sat upright in a hospital bed screaming at the top of her lungs, startling her mother.

***SPN***

Lucifer appeared at Liz's door and knocked on it before he could talk himself out of it. The door opened almost immediately.

Liz looked, understandably, surprised to see him. She also looked very tired. She had dark bags under her eyes, like she hadn't been sleeping well.

He couldn't stop himself from reaching out mentally across the bond, but Liz's end was still closed off.

"What are you doing here?" She sounded resigned.

"I'm ending the apocalypse." Lucifer cut straight to the point.

She raised an eyebrow at him. "I think you better come in."

She turned and walked away, and Lucifer followed her. They both sat down at the kitchen table.

"Explain." She ordered.

"There was a group of pagan gods gathered at the Elysian Fields Hotel, plotting to kill me. I was going to ignore it but I heard that Gabriel and the Winchester brothers were there. Gabriel had a weapon that could kill me; and, well, Sam's my vessel."

"How many are dead?" Liz said suddenly.

"No one died. The worst I did was knock them out. I swear." It came out a little desperate. But that's because he was.

She studied his face, searching for any sign of a lie. Eventually she nodded. "Okay, continue."

"I confronted Gabriel, and he stood up to me. He stayed behind to give the Winchesters time to escape. And he made some interesting points, defending humanity." He looked down. "But I didn't really hear them. And then I went to kill him. I realized I couldn't kill my brother. When I realized that, I really considered what he had said. And I realized that I don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to destroy the humans and I don't want to go through with the apocalypse, not anymore." He took a breath. "I healed Jo, too. She's back to normal now."

"Luci." Liz says tenderly. She reached across the table and took his hand.

But he wasn't done yet. "And I know that words are no guarantee. So I'm going to prove it to you."

He reached in on himself and pulled out his connection to hell. He saw a burst of light swirl from his chest, and then his vision went dark.

When he came too he felt two fingers digging into the side of his neck. He realized that Liz was checking his pulse. He sat up and Liz gave a start.

She sat down next to him. "What the hell was that?"

"I pulled out my connection to hell."

Liz's eyes widened. He knew she understood what this meant. The connection to hell was what was keeping his powers working. Now that it was gone he would eventually become human.

" _You're really serous then_." He realized that she had opened up her end of the bond.

" _Yes_."

" _Why would you come back to New York_? _After everything I said_ …"

" _Liz, after everything how could I not come back_?" But through the bond he felt her self-doubt. And he realized he had never said the words to her." _Elizabeth Holloway, I love you. I love you now and I'll love you to the end of my life._ "

She surged forward and kissed him passionately and Lucifer responded eagerly. Twenty four hours ago he thought he'd never see her again, and now things were better than they had ever been between them.

" _I love you too_." She told him. And to hell with Michael and the apocalypse; he had finally found a place where he was accepted. And you know what? He was happy.


	17. Chapter 17

Dean Winchester was not a happy camper.

It had been two months since the apocalypse had mysteriously stopped, and no one seemed to know what was going on. Not the angels, not the demons, not even the freaking pagans.

The demons had just gone crazy. It seemed that they didn't know what to do without Lucifer. Who, by the way, had just disappeared, and no one seems to know what happened to him. Cas likes to say that it's the work of God; and while Dean doesn't think it's likely he has no other explanation.

There was some word that angels were helping to fight the demons; but they made sure to stay far away from them. Dean felt it was a bad idea to let the god-squad anywhere near Cas, and Cas agreed that it would just cause trouble.

So now they were tracking down a lead in New Jersey. They were only thirty minutes away from NYC, close enough to consider swinging by to say hello to Liz and Gilgamesh. But doing that would mean dealing with the inevitable awkwardness that would occur, seeing as how they hadn't talked in so long.

So instead of focusing on memories he focused on work. But apparently they somehow missed out on one very important fact. The thing wasn't a hell demon, it was a  _chaos_  demon. How in the world had they managed to find the one case that they weren't prepared for? Winchester luck.

The moment they found its layer it threw Sam through a wall and started attacking Cas. Luckily Cas has his angel blade and then they started dueling like in a real old fashioned sword fight. Unfortunately, they seemed to be pretty evenly matched. So Dean ran out to the impala and began searching through the trunk for the bullets Liz had given him. Apparently they were made of one of the celestial metals; but at the moment the only thing Dean cared about was that they killed Chaos demons.

He found the magazine quickly, clicked into his gun, and ran to rejoin the fight. He flung the door open and saw that the demon had managed to disarm Cas. Without hesitating Dean shot the thing in the back. It lit up red then crumpled to dust.

"Thanks." Cas was breathing heavily.

"You're welcome." Dean said as he rushed over to Sam.

Sam was already coming around, thank god. "Dean?" Sam asked groggily.

Now that they were out of danger Dean started to worry. What the hell was a chaos demon doing so close to New York? Liz needed to be warned.

***SPN***

It had been two months since the end of the apocalypse. And life had just gone on. Liz almost got whiplash from how fast things settled down.

Hell was in complete disarray. Without the apocalypse everything had just gone to pieces. Crowley had gained a following among some of the demons, but most of them refused to follow a demon that had rebelled against Lucifer. Especially since most of them believed Lucifer might still come back and punish dissenters.

Heaven had retreated from earth at first, but then Gabriel had gone back. And now heaven was actively fighting the demons and making sure they didn't cause any major damage. And there was also a search for Lucifer going on, but no one had even thought to look in New York City.

And speaking of Lucifer, things were going great. They were living together; they had been since the beginning. Liz hadn't even thought of suggesting otherwise.

Lucifer had been determined to act as human as possible. Right on the first day he had declared that he was going to get a job. After three days of looking he had found a job at a rescue shelter, looking after the animals.

And because Liz's 'job' kept her out at odd hours Lucifer was often home before she was. And he had started cooking. Lucifer was a culinary master. Every night she came home to some new dish Lucifer had decided he wanted to make. She had told him that he didn't have to cook every night, but he said that he enjoyed cooking. Liz had been used to living off of take out and restaurant food, so it was a pleasant change.

Lucifer had tried to conserve his grace. But sometimes there were situations where he had to use his powers. Like the morning he lost track of time and had to fly to work to avoid being late. The day one of the dogs at the shelter got really sick and he cured it. The time he accidently blew up the stove (she still wasn't sure how he had managed that) and had used his mojo to clean up the mess and repair the damage. She was sure there were other situations where he had used his powers even if he hadn't told her. Then a demon came to New York and Lucifer had smote it, so no one would find out where he was hiding. Liz knew that had drained his powers more than he cared to admit. But she hadn't realized how close to the edge he was until one day he was helping her and Gilgamesh take down a gang of bank robbers. One of them got lucky and stabbed him in the chest. Lucifer had gone down hard.

Liz had been furious. She had knocked out the men who hadn't been subdued already with Egyptian magic even though she had a rule to only use it in dire emergencies and never against regular mortals.

When Gilgamesh pulled the knife out a burst of grace had swirled around the wound but it hadn't healed, and before they could sew him up he lost a lot of blood. When he sat up, she saw that his power was gone, he was completely human. Liz could feel his fear, and she could understand. If demons or angels found him he wouldn't be able to defend himself; he still had his sword skills but they could pin him to a wall or snap his neck from across the room.

That night was also the first time they shared a bed. Lucifer had realized he needed to sleep and he had offered to sleep on the couch. Liz had rolled her eyes at that, told him to stop being ridiculous, and had pulled him into bed. They just slept, and they woke up in a tangle of limbs.

Lucifer had adjusted pretty well to being completely human, but he still got frustrated when he got a minor injury like paper cut and couldn't heal it.

Right now they were watching a movie. Liz unabashedly loved movie nights. When they just snuggled on the couch and ate popcorn and she grumbled over the scientific inaccuracies and he dissected every little part of the movie even if they'd seen it before. It might not sound like fun to other people but it was heaven to Liz. Just sitting here enjoying movies with the person she loved, and loved her in return.

Then there was a knock at the door. "I'll get it." Liz said automatically.

She got up and pulled on her jacket as Lucifer immediately paused the movie for her. She walked to the door and opened it; and was taken back by the sight of Dean Winchester and two unfamiliar men at her door.

"Hey Liz." Dean smiled.

"Dean, what are you doing here?" She hissed.

"Umm, it's a long story. Can we come in?" he asked.

Then Lucifer appeared behind her. "Liz who is…" He froze when he caught sight of who she was talking too.

The two men standing next to Dean reacted at the sight of him. One of the men drew back horrified and the other drew his weapon (which Liz was interested to note was an angel blade).

The second man brandished the blade. "Dean get back!"


	18. Chapter 18

Dean grabbed Cas' sleeve. "Cas, wait!"

Cas gave him a confused look, but Dean focused his attention on Liz. "Explain."

Liz sighed. "It's a long story, you better come in."

***SPN***

Dean couldn't believe his ears.

Liz had told him the story but he was having a hard time processing it. Before he had flicked holy water at her just to make sure because w _hat the hell_. Liz was in a serious relationship with the  _devil_. And she had convinced Lucifer to cancel the apocalypse. Again,  _what the hell_.

Lucifer had gone into the kitchen mumbling something about needing to put something away. Dean couldn't really blame him, seeing as how most of the people in the room had wanted him dead and he was now powerless. Cas was sitting across the room at the kitchen table glaring mistrustfully at Lucifer, but Dean could tell he had been listening to Liz's story intently. Sam was leaning against the wall near the door, not looking at anyone. And Dean and Liz were sitting on the couch.

Dean realized that they had been sitting in silence for several moments, and his mouth was hanging open. He snapped it shut.

"What the _hell_?" He asked.

"Yeah I know, it's kind of crazy." Liz said calmly.

"Yeah. Only kind of crazy." Dean said sarcastically. "This must be the craziest thing you've ever…"

"Dean Winchester." Liz interrupted. "We hunted together for a year and half, so you know that this isn't even close to the craziest thing I've ever done. This isn't even in the top twenty five. So do us both a favor and don't finish that sentence."

"If half the rumors I've heard are true this isn't even in the top hundred." Cas commented from across the room.

Liz grinned. "See, Dean? Even the complete stranger agrees. I'm crazy, get over it."

Dean rolled his eyes.

"So what's going to happen with Lucifer?" Sam asks quietly. "Are we just going to give him a free pass? Are we just going to pretend like the apocalypse never happened?"

Surprisingly, it's Lucifer who answers. "No Sam, we're not. If I was pretending that the apocalypse hadn't happened I would have gone back to heaven. Gabriel already has gone back and playing pagan would be viewed as way worse than what I did, so I'm sure that I'd have been accepted. I'm remaining on earth because I am atoning for what I've done. I'm doing a lot of community service and I'm helping Liz with her guardian duties."

"I'm guessing that isn't the only reason why you've stayed." Sam looked accusingly at Liz.

"No, not the only reason." Lucifer admitted, smiling slightly.

"So Dean, what brings you to New York?" Liz asks.

"We were working a hunt in Jersey and it turned out to be a chaos demon. I thought you should know, seeing as how it was so close to New York." Dean said.

Liz and Lucifer exchange a look. "Yeah, chaos energy is increasing worldwide and the chaos demons are getting bolder."

Sam frowns. "Why? What's causing it?"

"I just don't know." Liz shrugs. But Dean can tell she's lying.

So after that phone numbers are exchanged, as are promises to call if they find out anything else. They decline the invite to stay for dinner and hit the road, Sam eager to put New York behind them. But Dean can't shake the feeling that they just walked into something big, like apocalyptic big.

Dean really hopes he's wrong. One apocalypse is enough for a life time.


	19. Chapter 19

It was the holiday season and every store was packed with people doing their last minute gift shopping. It had taken Lucifer an hour at the supermarket to get everything he needed when it would normally have taken five minutes. He was exhausted and couldn't wait to get home.

He was only two blocks from the apartment when he noticed he was being followed, by  _Inias_. Lucifer felt terrified. How had heaven managed to find him?

He dropped the groceries and ran. Behind him Inias tried to keep up, but he hadn't yet mastered the skill of navigating through the crowd and he quickly fell behind. When he had put enough distance between them he slowed to a walk, as to not attract attention.

He was only a quarter of a block away from home when Gabriel appeared in front of him. Lucifer didn't hesitate; he darted down the nearest alleyway. He knew it was a dead end but he also knew how ruthless his bothers could be; he didn't want anyone else to get hurt because of him.

He turned around at the end of the alley and slipped his blade out of his sleeve just as Gabriel appeared in the mouth of the alley.

"Hello Luci." Gabriel called as he walked closer to where Lucifer stood. He looked solemn, the opposite of how he normally looked.

Lucifer didn't respond, instead he launched himself at Gabriel. Gabriel easily parried and returned a strike of his own. Lucifer's decreased strength meant he could only deflect it, and the blow glanced against his arm. It was a deep cut; he could feel the blood seeping down his arm.

Gabriel momentarily froze at the sight of blood, seemingly surprised. Then Lucifer was tossed through the air and pinned against the wall. He struggled, but it was no use. Lucifer knew he was about to die. " _I'm sorry Liz._ " He thought desperately, but she was too far away and wouldn't be able to hear.

Then Gabriel tapped his forehead and everything went dark.

***SPN***

Lucifer woke up and found that he was handcuffed to a chair.

The room he was in was completely white, and the only thing in it was the chair he was cuffed to and the table in front of him. The room had no windows or doors, but he knew he was being watched.

Lucifer ran his hands over the cuffs, and he realized they were ordinary handcuffs. He had an emergency paperclip hidden up his sleeve and he decided that he wanted the cuffs off. It only took him two and a half minutes to get them off.

He rubbed his wrists and looked around the room again. There seemed to be no way out for someone who couldn't teleport. And he couldn't do that anymore. There was nothing to do until his brothers decided to kill him.

Then he heard the sound of wings rustling and before him, looking high and mighty, stood Michael.

"Hello brother." Michael said.

"Hello Michael. How'd you find me?"

"The humans closely monitor each other. It was a simple matter to gain accesses to their surveillance systems." Michael said plainly.

Lucifer remembered Liz telling him about how the NSA was getting more and more intrusive in its surveillance. Lucifer shook his head. After all their careful planning, they hadn't even considered that the angels might use human methods to find him.

Lucifer realized that Michael was studding him intently. "What?" Lucifer asked defensively.

Michael smirked. "Just looking at how far you've fallen, brother."

"I haven't fallen, I've been enlightened." It was the truth. He had learned so much from his time among humans. And if he was honest, being human suited him. In heaven, he had been suffocated by the strict rules and absolute order. And in hell the absence of rules made everything too chaotic. On Earth, humans had the perfect mixture of chaos and order in their lives, and he thrived in it.

Michael tilted his head. "I don't understand."

Lucifer sighed. "You wouldn't, because you hate the humans just as much as I did."

Michael stiffened at that but Lucifer continued.

"They have a capacity for greatness that the entirety of the host seems to have missed. The question is raised that, if you love them as much as father told you to, how haven't you noticed it? Is it because you think yourself above them?"

"Never." Michael declared. "I am loyal to our father."

"But are you loyal to  _them_?"

"Of course!"

"You were prepared to let them die as  _collateral damage_. That doesn't sound very loyal to me." Lucifer felt a hot thick emotion burning at the back of his throat. It took a moment to realize what it was.

It was anger. Michael was a hypocrite. Michael hated the humans as much as he had, but had never faced any consequences. And Michael had punished him for believing the same thing. And even now Michael still didn't like the humans or feel a sense of allegiance to them. And if Lucifer was going to die, his last act was going to be calling Michael out on his bullshit.

" _I_ was prepared to let them die? You're the one who waged war on them."

"And I spent millennia in hell for it. Then when I got out, I stopped the war. I ended the apocalypse."

"You disobeyed father's last orders. For what?"

"Gabriel. He may be a pain but he occasionally has good ideas. And he made a strong argument at the Elysian Fields." It was a half-truth; he never would have gotten his head out of his ass if Gabriel hadn't knocked some sense into him. But he never would have listened to Gabriel if it wasn't for Liz. "And besides, if father had truly wanted the apocalypse to happen it would still be happening. I believe all this was a test to see if we could learn from our mistakes."

"Do you really expect me to believe you? After everything you did?"

"I became human, I'm living among them. I stopped the apocalypse for them. I can only tell you the truth; I can't make you believe it."

Michael paused. There was a vein visibly throbbing in his forehead. "You've still committed treason. You still started a civil war that killed hundreds of our siblings." A blade appeared in Michael's hands. "You still need to face punishment for your crimes." He raised the blade.

Suddenly Gabriel appeared between Michael and Lucifer. "Michael, no."

"Excuse me?"

"He's already been punished. Let it go." Gabriel pleaded.

"Alright, fine." Michael said. "But I…"

But Gabriel grabbed ahold of Lucifer's shirt and vanished before Michael could finish his sentence.

They appeared in the alleyway where Gabriel had abducted him.

"Thanks Gabe." Lucifer said.

"Is it true?" Gabriel asked suddenly.

"Is what true?"

"Everything you said about the apocalypse. Is it true?" Lucifer only then noticed the tears in Gabriel's eyes.

"Yes, it's true."

Gabriel hugged him tightly. "Thank you."

"For what?"

"For listening. For stopping the apocalypse. For not fighting Michael."

"You're welcome."

Gabriel gave Lucifer his blade back. "I'll talk to Michael, calm him down."

"Thank you Gabriel. Take care of yourself."

Gabriel nodded. "You too." And then he was gone.

Lucifer suddenly feels exhausted. He trudged back to the apartment, barely noticing the people around him.

When he gets home Liz is sitting on the couch. But she gets up the moment she sees his face.

" _What's wrong_?" She asks as she pulls him onto the couch.

The entire story cones spilling out and he can't stop the words. He feels wrecked. After everything his brother still thinks he deserves to die. When the words are exhausted Liz pulls him close and hugs him; and he just collapses in her arms.

Liz presses light kisses to the side of his neck and he's just  **so**  glad she's here because he doesn't know where he'd be without her.

" _Come on, let's go to bed_." She whispers after a while.

He lets himself be lead into the bedroom and pulled under the comforters.

He doesn't know what will happen with Michael. He doesn't know what will happen tomorrow or even next week. But he knows that whatever will happen, Liz will be there with him.


	20. Chapter 20

Three weeks after Lucifer's meeting with his family, it happens.

Chaos energy ricocheted through the duat with such intensity that it physically brought Liz to her knees. Pain wracked through her body and her vision went dark.

When Liz came back to herself, she picked herself up off the kitchen floor, and tried to figure out what the hell had just happened.

The energy had not been specifically aimed at her, because if it had been it would have been stopped by the magical protection around the border of the city. It felt like she had caught the backlash of an attack aimed elsewhere. But what the hell had required so much energy that the  _backlash_ had been enough to knock her off her feet?

Then the text alert on her phone went off. It was from an unknown number. The text read "This is only the beginning" and below that was a link to a news feed.

Liz clicked the link and was taken back by what she saw. It was live coverage of "The Attack on Orlando."

The entire city had been reduced to ashes. Orlando, Florida was the home to Disney World, Sea World, tons of other tourist destinations, and plenty of residential areas too. Thousands, maybe even tens of thousands, were dead.

The reporter said that the U.S. government had no idea who was responsible for the attack, but Liz did.

It was the chaos demons. And if Liz was right, this was nothing compared at what was to come.

Before Liz could figure out what the hell she was supposed to do next, there was a knock at the door.

She looked through the peephole to check who it was, and she didn't recognize the person standing in front of the door.

Liz pulled on her jacket and made sure that her blade was easily accessible as she opened the door.

"Good evening, Miss Holloway." The man said solemnly.

"Who are you?" Liz demanded.

The man stood up straighter and suddenly Liz  _felt_ waves of power rolling off the stranger.

"I am God."

Liz punched him in the nose.

"Ow! You broke my nose!" God pinched his nose in an attempt to stem the blood flowing down his face. "How did you even do that?"

"I'm a special child." Liz replied impassively.

"I suppose I deserved that." God sighed. "Can I come in?"

Liz wanted to slam the door in his face, but she felt like she had already pushed her luck enough (after all, this was the guy who had slaughtered entire villages on a whim) and let him in.

He sat down at the kitchen table and then Liz heard a whooshing sound from behind her. She turned and saw Gabriel and two men standing next to him.

Liz crossed her arms and glared at them. "What the hell! Did my apartment suddenly turn into Grand Central?"

Gabriel held up his hands. "We were summoned."

God cleared his throat, and Liz turned to glare at him. "There are things we need to discuss." He said, almost apologetically.

"I don't understand what we could  _possibly_  need to discuss with a  _human._ " One of the men standing next to Gabriel said. "And father, what happened to your nose?"

God seemed to have forgotten that his nose was still broken. "Oh, Liz punched me in this face." He said as he healed his injury.

Gabriel grinned at her, while the men standing next to him glared. Liz glared back and snuck a look at them in the duat and found that they were archangels. After everything she'd heard about them from Lucifer; Raphael and Michael didn't look so impressive.

After a minute of tense, uncomfortable silence Liz spoke up. "So I suppose we should get down to business."

"Not yet." God said. "We're still waiting for someone."

Liz put the pieces together just as she heard the key turn in the lock of the door. She moved so she was between the angels and the door as Lucifer walked into the apartment.

" _Luci, what are you doing here?_ " Liz asked him.

" _I saw on the news about the attack on_ _Orlando, and then I got a bad feeling like you were in trouble. So I came home to make sure you were okay._ " Lucifer's hand slipped into her's.

Gabriel looked at her surprised. But his brothers looked wrathful.

Michael stormed up to Liz and got in her face. "It all makes sense now. You're the whore who-."

Michael was cut off when Liz's fist collided with his face. Then she unsheathed her blade and pressed it up under his chin, so she knew he would be paying attention to what she said. "Okay listen up. I'm not an underling you can walk all over. I don't know if you know who I am, but I'm Elizabeth-fucking-Holloway. I've been to purgatory. I've walked through hell. I've been to so many levels of the duat that I've lost track. I've fought beings that would make you look like a fledgling. I walked into the Fortress of Nyx, fought my way through the armies of the night, slew the mad god Erebus, burned the place to the ground, and escaped with my life and sanity intact. So show me some respect."

Michael looked at her with a burning hatred in his eyes and Liz returned the glare with the same intensity.

"Liz, I think you made your point." Lucifer said quietly.

Liz slowly dropped her arm.

"Well now that we've gotten that out of the way, I think we can get down to business." God said, breaking the tension.

Everyone sat down at the table without any further comment.

Lucifer somehow ended up sitting next to God, who kept attempting to catch his eye. To avoid it, Lucifer was staring resolutely at the table. Liz could sense his anger and she knew he hadn't forgiven his father in the slightest.

"You all have heard about the destruction of Orlando, correct?" God asked.

Everyone nodded.

God took a deep breath before he continued. "Well as some of you may have guessed, this attack was preformed by chaos demons. What you aren't aware of, is that this attack is just the opening shot in a new war with chaos."

Liz had guessed as much. But looking around at the varying degrees of surprise that the archangels were wearing, she was the only one not taken completely by surprise. Liz guessed that being suddenly presented with the news that they were going to fighting a war for the fate of reality itself wasn't something they were prepared for.

"But... how?" Raphael asked.

"Well, chaos energy has been building since the fall of Rome. Eventually enough energy is amassed so that portals from the Sea of Chaos appear on Earth. Enough time passes and you have a well sized army of chaos demons ready to wreck havoc." Liz explained. She realized that everyone at the table was looking at her and she looked down. Liz had never liked being the center of attention.

"How do we proceed, father?" Michael asked. It amazed Liz how child-like he sounded.

"Well first, you all need to understand that heaven cannot win this war alone." Michael and Raphael started to protest but god silenced them with a wave of his hand. "If reality is to survive, there needs to be a united front. You will need to form alliances with the pagans, the demons of hell, the fae, the children of Eve, and the hunters."

"Father, I already count two lost causes." Lucifer looked God in the eye as he spoke. "The hunters won't fight along supernatural creatures, and there is no way the demons will fight along angels."

"Well, if the demons are instructed by their lord to fight along angels, then I think that they will." God said mischievously. Then he put a hand on Lucifer's shoulder and Lucifer reacted as if he had been shocked.

On the physical plane nothing happened. But when Liz lowered her gaze to the duat...

Lucifer's feather's turned from dark black to bright silver. His grace was crackling with power, and with a jolt Liz realized that his connection to heaven had been restored. He looked better for it, his Grace glowed in a way that it never had when he had been connected to hell. She knew know why they had called him the 'morning star,' his grace shone brighter then the other archangels'.

"Lucifer, I want you to return to hell. The demons will follow you when you call on them." God declared.

Liz noticed how tense Lucifer was, so she slipped her hand into his. Instantly, he began to relax. He had probably been worried about how she would feel if he became the devil again.

God turned his attention to Gabriel. "Gabe, you have ties to the fae and the pagans. I want you to start negotiations with them."

"Uh, Dad." Gabriel said, nervously. "The pagans might not be willing to speak to me. They only just found out I was an angel and they'll probably try to kill me on sight."

Liz snorted at that. "Dude, everyone knew you were an angel. It was probably the worst kept secret in history. Why do you think people made an extra effort to be on your good side?"

"Oh." Gabriel smiled sheepishly. "I guess I can start negotiations then."

Then God turned towards her and smiled.

"Now lets see, Elizabeth Holloway; You have ties to the pagans, the fae, the children of Eve, and the hunters! And I am sure that any of those groups will listen if you go to them because you truly are a remarkable human. I understand what my son sees in you."

"Dad!"

"Now hush Luci, let me finish." God said with a wink at Liz. "Even though some might say that your humanity leaves you disadvantaged in a world of monsters, you have the gained respect of all the groups I have mentioned. Even the angels in heaven sing the songs of your adventures. And you are one of five humans who have had that honor. So while  _some_  of my sons may wonder why I choose to include to include you, you have more than earned your place at this table."

"But this actually is my table." Liz protested, even though she knew she was blushing.

God actually laughed at that comment. "That is true, in more ways than you might think."

"Now Raphael and Michael." As God addressed them they sat up even straighter the they were sitting before, if such a thing was possible. "You need to make sure heaven is in shape. Everything needs to be in order if heaven is to survive this war."

"Wait, father. Aren't you coming back?" Raphael asked.

"I'm sorry Raph, but I can't. The universe has been use to moving without a God to micro-manage it's path for around 2,000 years. Order has changed so that it functions without me taking an active role in everything. With the universe as unstable as it is, my sudden return could tear a hole in reality; and that's what we're trying to avoid. I think this is the last you all will be seeing of me for a long time. But know that I have faith in you all. Goodbye, my children." And then he was gone.

***SPN***

Lucifer was having a little trouble processing everything; because seriously,  _what the hell._

So first it's just suddenly dropped on him that he's supposed to fight in a war where the entire universe was at stake (and he did not miss out on the fact that Liz wasn't nearly as surprised as she should have been), then he's suddenly restored to full strength by the person who had cast him down in the first place, told to retake control of something to save the world that he had originally given up to save the world, and then was his father's treatment of Liz.

When he had stopped the apocalypse and started atoning he had imagined his father meeting Liz. But he had assumed that his father would be cold and distant and would barely tolerate Liz's presence. Instead he had been warm, and going so far as too single her out and compliment her.

Lucifer wondered if his father's treatment of them was his way of extending an olive branch. His father had really stepped up today, but Lucifer didn't know if he was ready to forgive him just yet. And his feelings for Michael were as jumbled as ever. Part of him still wanted to kill Michael and another part wanted to go to him and beg for acceptance.

He registered the sounds of Michael and Raphael leaving for heaven without a goodbye.

"So I'm off to Oz. It should be a quick trip, the guys down there are most likely to listen to me." Gabriel was saying.

"Yeah okay. Remember to pack your ruby slippers, Dorothy." Liz responded.

"Ha ha."

"Hey, Gabriel." Lucifer said suddenly. "You should come around for dinner sometime. We'd love to have you."

"I'll definitely do that." Gabriel smiled. "And next time I come over, someone is going to explain to me how Satan is in a stable relationship with an actual saint!" He vanished with a melodramatic, CRACK!

Lucifer turned to Liz with a self depreciating smile plastered to his face. " _So yeah, that's my family. They're pretty much always like that_."

" _Luci, I'm sorry but I think you're the normal one_." She said with a straight face, and that made him smile for real because he actually  _was_.

" _So um, about the hell thing..._ " He started nervously.

She rolled her eyes. " _Relax hell boy. I'm cool with it. You're only doing it to save reality. And besides, someone needs to keep all of those demons in line."_

_"Okay, thanks for being understanding."_

_"There's no need to thank me."_ Liz sighed and pulled out her phone.

Lucifer pulled it out of her hand. " _What do you think you're doing."_

" _I need to meet with the local alphas to see if they can get me in touch with the top dogs."_

" _You can do that in the morning. You were up all night last night doing dad-knows-what. Tonight you need sleep."_

Liz let herself be dragged into the bedroom. She fell asleep pretty quickly, testament to how tired she was. He was back at full strength so he didn't need to sleep, so he was left alone with his thoughts.

The last war of chaos had happened when he was so young, he barely remembered it. But if he was correct, it had been close. They had only won because at the last moment Ra almost burned himself up using his life force to exile Apophis to the sea of chaos. If Ra, a primordial force, had almost burned himself up defeating Apophis; what did that mean for Liz, Ra's vessel?


	21. Chapter 21

_Deep in the Duat, Apophis seethed._

_He was vast and infinite, an uncontrollable force._

_But his brothers had trapped him in their first home, the sea of chaos. In the beginning he hadn't minded so much. But then he discovered, that while_ he _was infinite, his home no longer was. He was cramped and cold. And even worse, as reality expanded, he began to feel it's presence. The putrid sent drove him mad. He didn't understand, how could his brothers live in such impurity? How could anything they made be fit for more than target practice?_

 _He had tried to bring reality down before; and that failure stung. He had counted on the loyalty of his littlest brother, only to be betrayed._ _And_ _he had been rash, he had rushed in without planning._ _But tucked away, he had millennium to_ _plot_ _and_ _plan. And soon, if everything went to according to plan, reality would be crushed beneath the weight of his armies._

_But something had to be done about the youngest Holloway._

"Liz."

_She could dam well muck up the whole thing. If Blake's plan failed to work..._

"Liz!"

Elizabeth Holloway blindly lunged forward as she awakened. She ended up knocking into Lucifer before she was awake enough to know where she was.

" _Sorry_." She said.

" _It's okay. You want to talk about it?"_ He asked.

" _Talk about what?_ " Liz got up to put on a pot of coffee. This hadn't been her first dream about the Sea of Chaos, since the attack on Orlando she'd begun to have them every night. But this had been the first one featuring Apophis himself, and the first one Lucifer had noticed.

He grabbed her wrist. " _You know what. You were having a nightmare, and I can tell it was a bad one. And you haven't had one like that in a_   _while_."

" _It wasn't a nightmare, not really._ "

" _Then what was it?_ "

 _"I don't want to talk about it."_  Because, really, what would she say? She shrugged her arm out his grip and made her way into the kitchen.

She put up a pot of coffee and then grabbed two pieces of bread and shoved them in the toaster.

Liz heard Lucifer rummaging around the bedroom, getting dressed. He had spent the past month trying to bring hell to order. Most of the demons had complied right away, but a few didn't like the fact that their king was a full powered archangel and that he expected them to fight alongside other angles.

She and Gabriel had been busy marshaling the pagans, the fae, and the children of Eve. The fae were creatures of magic, and they had sensed the rise in Chaos activity. They were eager to help. The pagans were creatures of magic too, but they were stubborn as mules and some were refusing to work with angles and demons. And Eve's first children believed the Rise of Chaos was happening, but some of the individual packs took work to convince.

Lucifer came into the kitchen just as the coffee was ready. He poured them both a mug and sat down across from her. His stony expression made it clear that he was frustrated with her.

Liz wanted to apologize, but apologizing would mean explaining. And Lucifer would drive himself crazy with worry if he knew. So she didn't say anything, and neither did he.

They ate the entirety of breakfast in silence.

" _Well I've got to be going now_." Lucifer said breaking the silence.

" _Okay, have a good day_." Liz said.

He vanished with hardly a sound.

Liz finished her breakfast and pulled her phone out to check reports. All of the major packs of the children of Eve had agreed, and most of the smaller packs had too. Only a few in the Midwest remained unconvinced. As for the pagans, the Egyptians were the first out of anyone to jump in, and She and Gabriel had convinced the Norse and the Hindu Pantheons. Some of the smaller Pantheons had joined voluntarily, without being asked. The Hindu, Egyptian, and Norse were well respected and the reason the other Pantheons had probably joined easily was because of their presence. She and Gabriel both thought that if they got the Greco-Romans (another well respected Pantheon) to join then it would be easy to convince the others.

The hunters were slowly being convinced. Liz had contacted Bobby, the Harvelle's, and the Winchesters for help, and they had agreed. The Winchesters were infamous, most hunters had stopped at the Roadhouse at one point or another, and  _everyone_ knew Bobby. So, slowly, the hunters were agreeing. Occasionally she'd get calls in the middle of the night by hunters demanding to know if Chaos really was really rising. But those were happening less frequently now.

What worried her was the fact that chaos had been quiet for a month now. Everyone knew what the attack on Orlando signified, but there was no sign of Chaos demons. Liz might of thought that the attack on Orlando was an isolated incident; if not for the fact that Chaos energy was increasing exponentially on a global scale.

And the fact that her dreams were featuring the Sea of Chaos every night were also worrying.

The only good thing about them was that she forgot the details soon after she woke up. They were usually just about the general Chaos that existed in that realm. But last night's dream, it had been about Apophis. he had let slip something  _important_ , something about  _her_ _._  But for the life of her she couldn't remember what it was.

Liz tried to put the dream from her mind. She had to get ready for negotiations and then she had to go pick up Lionel. Lionel had objected strongly to being excused from the negotiation process, saying that as he was Lyall's heir, he should be helping convince other werewolf packs to join the cause.

But because Lionel was hotheaded and completely incapable of taking any gruff, and supernatural creatures in general are fond of dishing out gruff. Having Lionel in the room during delicate negotiations seemed like a recipe for disaster.

But Lionel insisted on being part of negotiations, so Liz was bringing Lionel with her to Olympus. Gabriel was bringing his son, Sleipnir, to distract Lionel so he couldn't cause trouble.

***SPN***

Gabriel knew today wasn't going to be a good day when they walked into the Hall of Olympus and found that Zeus was in more of a Jupiter mood today.

Fast-forward about thirty minutes and they've gotten absolutely nowhere. Hell, they've actually gone backwards. Jupiter has been insisting on revisiting and then disagreeing on everything that Zeus had agreed to the previous day. Hera's been trying to talk sense into her husband for the entirety of the session. But, as usual, she is having no success whatsoever.

If he strained, Gabriel could hear Sleipnir and Lionel talking. At the moment they were laughing about something. At least  _they_  were having a good time. At the moment he and Liz were trying to explain to Jupiter why it was unreasonable to demand Shiva's death from the Hindu Pantheon for something that happened over three centuries ago. Liz appeared to be completely calm on the surface, but judging from the tension in her neck, she was nearing her breaking point. And so was he.

Gabriel was about to suggest they take a break when an explosion rocked the earth.

Beside him Hera gasped. "Chaos Demons!"

Well thank you captain obvious!

Gabriel summoned his weapon and around him Liz, Jupiter, and Hera did the same.

Then they exited the temple and joined the fray.


	22. Chapter 22

Outside there was absolute mayhem.

Obviously Olympus' security left much to be desired because the attack appeared to have caught the Greco-Romans completely off guard.

Liz examined the situation. It was not good. Using a small spell, she summoned her armor.

"Zeus, go to the amphitheater, there are people trapped inside, you need to get them out. They're sitting ducks in there." Liz snapped. "Hera, I need you to make sure that the entrance to tartarus is still sealed. If the prisoners escape, it'll be catastrophic." Tartarus was prison to the worst monsters, the kind of twisted beings that would not hesitate into going over to Apophis.

Liz turned her attention to Gabriel as Hera and Zeus stormed off. "Gabe, I need you to go and get reinforcements, we won't be able to hold this place for long." And with a flicker of wings he was gone, too.

"Sleipnir, get Lionel and get inside." Liz said, gesturing to the abandoned senate house. "Stay there and  _don't_ make any noise. If you guys get hurt it'll be my head."

Without waiting for a reply, she darted off towards the marketplace, where the fighting was thickest.

The soldiers were panicking. They had been unprepared for an assault on this scale and there was no commanding officer to give them orders.

They were spread too thin. "Soldiers of Olympus, rally to me!" She shouted loudly, using magic so her voice would cut through the carnage.

A couple of soldiers flanked her, and she led them forward in a charge, hacking and slashing.

As they moved forward more soldiers joined her line, and soon enough they were a solid wave pushing the chaos demons back and gaining momentum.

Then there were shouts from behind her and Liz felt a sinking feeling in her stomach. Risking a glance behind her she saw what she feared.

They had been surrounded.

Behind her, the pagan troops pushed forward in panic. But in the front they were being pushed back, the chaos demons had gained an edge and now momentum was working against them.

A shrill shrieking sound pierced the air and the chaos demons stopped advancing. After the pagans drew back a few feet away from the chaos demons, Liz called them to a halt.

There was tense moment of silence. Liz forced down her fear, and made herself look composed. They were all looking to her, if she freaked out they would freak out too.

Liz took stock of the situation. After a second Liz had to admit, things didn't look good.

Then a chaos demon wearing more ornate armor than the others stepped forward. Liz recognized that it must be a commanding officer.

"Let me make this simple. You are outnumbered. My men have you surrounded. If this battle continues, we will slaughter you all." It said. "But we will leave, we will let you live, if you give us Elizabeth Holloway."

There was a moment of silence. Then from behind her a voice that sounded a lot like Zeus' rang out, "No way! We're not giving her up. Especially not to a bloody bastard like you."

Cheers of assent rang throughout the ranks.

The demon twitched. "On your own heads, so be it."

The demons started to advance again, and Liz braced herself.

Then a war horn rang out; and the chaos demons stopped again, evidently confused.

Liz grinned, because she  _knew_ that sound. And by the way captain chaos demon started fidgeting, it recognized the sound too.

Reinforcements had arrived.

Liz suddenly heard another sound that was familiar, the sound of warfare. They had attacked the rear of the chaos demons.

Liz called out to her own men, "Forward," and with a cry they reentered the fray.

***SPN***

Liz hated the aftermath of a battle. The lists of casualties and the tents of wounded would always be terrible. The top brass figuring out what the hell they were supposed to do next was frustrating to watch and frustrating to be apart of.

But at the moment, the thing she was concerned with the fact that Lucifer had gotten injured and was trying to get out of going to the infirmary.

She'd had a cut on her shoulder; but it was so small that she'd taken care of it herself, after she'd gotten out of her armor. It had only needed like two stitches, it was barely a scratch.

On the other hand Lucifer had what she suspected to be a broken arm, and he needed to get it set. But he was making a damn nuisance of himself, insisting that he was fine when he couldn't move his arm without wincing.

Liz lost her patience, grabbed the sleeve on his good arm, and dragged him into one of the medical tents.

"Sit," She gestured to an open cot.

He sat, but not without grumbling under his breath about how she was being unreasonable.

Raphael came over. As heaven's healer, he must be swamped right now. "What seems to be the problem?"

"I think your idiot brother broke his wrist." Liz told him, and a ghost of a smile flickered across Raphael's face.

Lucifer spoke up. "I don't think it's anything..."

"I also think my idiot brother has broken his wrist." Raphael interrupted. He snapped his fingers, and a cast appeared around the break. "How'd he manage this?"

Liz shrugged. "I think he got something thrown at him, the details are hazy."

"You guys do realize that I'm right here, right?" Lucifer asked.

"You lie." Raphael said. Liz nodded in agreement.

"No, you two are not allowed to gang up on me." Lucifer complained. "Liz, you're supposed to be on my side!"

"Occasionally our interests line up, but I'm on my own side. It's not my fault you haven't gotten that by now." Liz smirked; and Raphael snorted, apparently amused.

Lucifer sputtered; but no one was paying him the slightest bit of attention because Sam Winchester just walked in, followed by Castiel, who was carrying a cursing Dean Winchester superman style.

Castiel put Dean down on the cot next to Lucifer's. "Can you look him over, brother? He's got nasty bruising on his stomach, and I'm afraid he's broken his ribs." Castiel asked.

Raphael sighed, but he walked over and began examining Dean. "They're only bruised, I believe the Elves have a salve that can reduce the pain and speed up the recovery time. I'll speak to them about getting it later."

"Thank you, brother." Castiel said.

"How did he get injured?" Liz asked.

"He got kicked." Sam shrugged.

"I was trying to get Cas's freaking blade. He was disarmed, and started freaking out about losing it!" Dean snapped.

"Dean, angel blades contain fragments of an angel's grace." Lucifer said. "Angels are generally careful with their own essence."

"Oh, I didn't know." Dean frowned. "Wait, what about Liz's?"

"Mine has fragments of my soul." Liz shrugged.

"Oh, cool."

Sam looked like he wanted to ask how that works, but Gabriel came in looking panicked.

"Liz, have you seen Sleipnir, or Lionel?" He asked, anxious.

Liz cursed herself. She had completely forgotten about them. The hell kind of god mother was she?

"Last I saw them, They were barricading themselves inside the senate house." Liz said trying to swallow her panic.

She doesn't exactly remember what happens next, but when she comes back to herself she's running through the streets of Olympus with Gabriel beside her.

They entire the senate house and its a disaster. Tables are overturned, papers are scattered, and chairs are smashed to pieces.

There's a bright red piece of paper on the floor, and Liz picks it up, hands trembling.

It says:

"Don't worry about the boys, I'll take good care of them.

- _Morgan Holloway"_

Fuck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I know that angels and some other beings have advanced healing or whatever but, in this story, Angels are creatures of order, so when they get injured by chaos demons, it doesn't heal instantaneously. And when other creatures get injured by chaos demons, angels can't heal them instantaneously. The same is true for chaos demons, if they're injured by the celestial metals or by an angel, they can't heal right away. The exceptions to the rule are God, Death, Apophis, and Ra.
> 
> About the angel blades, when angels are given a blade, they give it a bit of their grace to power it. That's why it works against the supernatural, because it's strengthened with divine essence. Generally this wouldn't work for humans, but because of a reason that I will go into later, Liz is the exception to the rule and she can power a blade with her soul.


End file.
